A Matter of Pride
by winged516
Summary: What about the others that escaped the School? What? No one told you there were more?
1. Here Kitty, Kitty

Hey Guys! This is my first fanfic. I do not own any of James Patterson's characters or ideas. This story is about other experiments that escape the School, so sorry. There is no Max, or Fang, or Iggy, or anyone else.

On with the show!

As the lights blinked on, I opened my eyes only to close them again. Too bright. Why did they have to make them so bright? I curled in the back of my cage and covered my face with my tail. Yes, a tail. I'll explain later.

Suddenly someone stopped in front of my cage and knelt with a clipboard in hand. He wrote down something and then looked up at me. Instinctively I opened my jaws and hissed. He narrowed his eyes at me in response. I didn't care what he thought about me. I knew his plan. And he knew that too.

"How does it keep getting out?" the whitecoat asked a female. It. I am an it. She squatted beside me and I let a low cat like growl escape my throat.

"We don't know," she said. "But I assure you all the cameras are faced directly on her now." The male whitecoat reached up and shook the door of the cage. I lunged forward, extracting claws from the tips of my fingers and swatted his hand. (Again, more on that later.) He pulled his hand back quickly. Darn, I'd missed.

I circled in the small cage and then collapsed on the ground with my chin resting on the top of my hands. "I think it's ready." My head lifted out of interest. Ready? They were probably running another test, I figured. Seeing how long I could go without food or water, testing my endurance, or worse, my self defense skills. They left me to wallow in my self pity and boredom.

My name is Cat. I am an experiment in the School. I don't know what it's really called, but here, its known as School. There are plenty of kids here, but no learning. This is where they experiment on children. They mix animals genes into our DNA to get freakish results. Abominations to humanity.

I am part lion. I don't know how much lion is in me. I'm mostly human. My hair is long and blonde and I have arms and legs like you or anyone else. But the thing is, I have a tail also. Nothing's wrong with extra appendages if you ask me. It's about three quarters the length of my legs. It has a slight curl with a tuft of blonde hair on the end. The fur on it is thicker than the hair on my arms or legs, making it fur like on animals. Then of course there's my claws. They come out of the tips of my fingers just like other big cats. I also care to walk on all fours, though I can walk on two legs. I am faster on feet and hands.

Those are the appearance differences. I am actually faster, stronger, and with better senses than any human. I'm not bragging. It's just true.

The thing is these experiments have weird powers sometimes. The ones like a fish boy that can breath air and water, a turtle girl that can scream loud enough to break glass on cue, or a dog. Or more appropriately, an Eraser. A person who can morph into an even more ferocious version of a dog. Any of you out there would think they were werewolves. You know what? You might just be right too.

I found my power recently. I can pass through things. Like a ghost. My molecules just become transparent. It's strange, but nice. I just recently figured this out, and not even the whitecoats knew. This was how I tried to escape about a week ago. Luckily the cameras weren't on me when I somehow passed through the cage. That was all I needed. I bolted for the outside. But I was caught, and nearly beaten to a pulp in the process. The second time, last night, also landed me in the same position. Sometimes I can't control it. The whitecoats have wised up though. Now I'm being watched around the clock.

Erasers run this place. They take orders like dogs and guard the school from any break ins/outs. They're only too happy to oblige any poor soul who decides to run, or just decides to exist, with a chase. Trust me, I know. I've been on the wrong end of the chase before.

I grew up in School for the most part. My parents were teenagers when I was born. So they put me up for adoption. I ended up being adopted by this horrible place. I can't blame them. They didn't know. They were, like sixteen at the time. When I was five they were married and decided to find me. I'm not sure how, but they did.

When they found me I was an uneducated, mutated, and scared kid who didn't even know how to talk. No one ever bothered to teach me. I don't remember how, but they took me. Outrunning the Erasers, they took me to live with them in an RV. I got to know them and grew attached to them. They taught me as quickly as they could to speak, read, write, and survive. My dad had been to the army and taught me at a young age how to shoot. My mom was the karate champion (go Mom!) of Arizona. So I knew how to survive. I already had the upper hand over most experiments.

When I was seven the Erasers caught up to us. They attacked the RV. My dad was at the wheel going as fast as the car would let him. But Erasers are ruthless. They'd tear my parents limb from limb. But what my little mind figured was that if they had me, they wouldn't have to chase my mom and dad anymore. I knew what I had to do. I jumped from a moving car, and was attacked by a scrambling pack of Erasers.

But it only took two of them to take me back. The rest went after my parents. I'm not sure what happened to them. And I don't want to know. Ever since then, I'm back at School. Living in a cage, in silence. I refuse to communicate with those monstrosities.

Now I paced on my hands and feet eagerly. It was restless living in such a small space. Another whitecoat walked by. I walked to the edge of the cage and watched him pass by the cages. My wrist hurt. I'd sprained it last night in the chase. It was among one of the many injuries from being tossed around Erasers like a rag doll. Let's just say I am one purple kitty.

Finally I stop moving and curl up in the back of the cage. Have to survive, I told myself. Mom and Dad risked their lives to make it so that I could. I wasn't about to let that sacrifice go to waste. So I decided to sleep. I spend a great deal of time sleeping. It got my mind off of things. It let me dream about living in some amazing place. Maybe a tiny apartment with mom and dad. Yeah, where we could worry about money. Where my dad can worry about boys I brought over. My mom can tell me how I shouldn't hide my pretty face behind my face. (As it turns out, I also have the ego of a cat.) Yeah...

WHAM!

My cage jolts and my claws automatically extend trying to grip the plastic floor. Suddenly a head pokes into my view. Jason, an Eraser who's been here as long as me, but he liked it here a lot more than I did. But that's an understatement. When they first started injecting him with the grafters, we had cages right beside each other. We were both scared and miserable together. But that was eleven years ago.

"Wakey, wakey. Eggs and Bakey," he sang irritatingly. He was the only one I'd ever talked to in this place.

"Down Jason. Don't scare it," a whitecoat said. He obediently stepped back, not letting his eyes off me. We stared at each other. Both of us knowing I would win this staring contest. I always did. But a whitecoat stepped in front of him with an electrified rod in his hand. I backed away, suppressing a whine. The cage opened and he backed up giving me room to get out.

Knowing what an electric shock could do to me and already in enough pain, I reluctantly obeyed.

"You really tore her up last night," the whitecoat said in a disappointed tone to Jason. The Eraser and my ex-friend smiled.

"Well, it's not my fault. She took a spill," he said smiling. I squinted angrily. I do not take spills. He tackled me and threw me from my legs into a tree trunk. Now my entire left side was a nice combination of greens, blues, blacks, purples, and yellows. With his rod close by he picked up my arm and observed it. All the while Jason taunted me with his stupid grin. The same one that I had long ago planned to swipe off.

Suddenly I felt a tingle. One that was very slowly becoming familiar to me. I was becoming transparent again. I glanced at my right arm. I could see through my own fingers. Uh oh. Not right now. Not in front of the whitecoat. Not in front of Jason.

I felt my body growing hot with panic. Apparently, so did the whitecoat.

"Something's wrong," the whitecoat said eyeing me suspiciously.

_You don't know the half of it, mister._ I whipped my arm back and jerked away like the scared little animal I was. We were alone in a gray room, there wasn't much place to go without passing through something. The whitecoat followed me as I crawled backwards with one hand afraid to touch anything solid with the transparent one.

"Come here," he ordered as he gripped the rod. I shook my head and continued to back away until I hit a wall. "Come now." He was close. Too close. He was leaned forward trying to grab my arm. He was also invading my personal space. My body tensed completely.

Without warning I pulled back my hand with extended claws and swiped the man's face. Three red lines appeared on his cheek. An internal alarm automatically went off in my head. Jason now had grounds to attack me. The whitecoat howled like a pansy and walked over to the other side of the room.

Jason was already on all fours galloping toward me. My arm was solid now. So I got into a running position and ran on the other side of the room. I charged at a wall and dug my black claws into the surface. Jason, who was now a black dog/wolf thing, reached up easily and grabbed my tail. He pulled it roughly.

"Yeoooow!" I screamed. He smiled a toothy grin.

"Here kitty, kitty." Oh if I had a dime for every time an Eraser said that to me... Flight wasn't working. It was time to fight.

"No stupid, stupid," I taunted back. I retracted my claws and fell right on top of him. He yipped as I landed. My hand went on his back. Curling my fingers and claws dug into flesh and fur. I put my head down and bit into the back of his neck. Jason recovered quickly and rolled me over until I let go.

I let go and landed on my back. He then pounced on my shoulders howling triumphantly as I struggled to get down from under him. His jaws lowered to take a bite at my jugular.

"Down Jason!" a voice ordered. Jason's drooling fangs stopped right before they could touch skin. Both of us were breathing heavily with excitement and adrenaline. Both of us refused to take our eyes off each other to see who had ordered him. "Jason, I gave you an order." He reformed to his human shape and got off of me.

"This isn't over," he said so only I could hear. Still abiding to my refusing to speak to the captors rule, I could only hope he could read my mind.

_Oh no, it's not. _I agreed.


	2. Others?

I glanced up to see about five whitecoats in the room including the one I clawed. They were all staring at me. They never looked at me, they observed. I stood on my back legs like they did and stared back at them.

"Down!" the one with the rod said. He poked me and a sharp pain made my entire body spasm. My knees buckled, but I managed to catch myself gracefully Whoa, they'd never zapped me that hard before. I must be in _really_ big trouble. He pointed rod's end at me.

"In the cage! Let's go," he said. I curled my hand into a fist frustrated. Then I ducked into my little cage. Once Jason was ushered out of the room I grabbed my tail that had been painfully pulled.

"That thing attacked me!" the clawed whitecoat said outraged. The rest of them started their way out of the room I was locked in. Secluded from the other mutants.

"Relax. We'll show you why it lashed out," said another whitecoat. My eyes widened. No. They saw? "If Jason's calmed down let him back in here to guard it. Get Alex too." Soon a blonde boy named Alex walked in with a glaring Jason right behind him.

"Freak," Jason said. My heart wrenched. My dad's voice echoed in my head. _No, honey. You're not a freak. You feel, think, and love like everyone else. That makes you normal._

"Takes one to know one," I hissed.

"You're pathetic. I could've killed you," Jason said. "You're lucky you were spared. You must be more of a freak than I thought if they want you enough to study alive." I crawled to the cage door.

"Hey, I got an idea. How about you come in here and say that to my face," I challenged. The end of my sentence ended with a growl.

"No, you see that's the difference between you and me. You're the one in the dog cage," he said.

"I'm not the one who should be caged." He smiled and shrugged.

"Yeah, but I'm not the one who is," he said. The rest of the day was filled with blood test and skin cell scraping. Jason watched me mocking my every move. Making my life even more of a living hell than it already was. Because, you know, things aren't hard enough. Every time I tried to curl up and get myself a nap he or Alex would kick my crate. Apparently, I'm pretty popular with the Erasers.

The night came, and someone changed shifts with the two of them. Finally some relaxation. So I curled up as I tended to do when I wanted to sleep and watched my tail tap up and down on the floor. If it wasn't for that tail I could be out there. With you and all of your people. I could be a part of your people.

Suddenly I heard something. A sharp scream of a kid. I lifted my head seeing a boy that had to be around fourteen being carried away. His hair was brown and his eyes were a dark blue. His skin just happened to be white covered in black stripes. My eyebrows lifted. A tiger. I remembered it from my big cats book my mom made me read. Maybe a white tiger.

The whitecoat treating him put his hand over his mouth. Bad move, he must be new. The tiger boy bit down with huge fangs that the whitecoat seemed to have forgotten about. The whitecoat dropped him. The tiger started up to his feet but could barely stand before there was a swarm of Erasers on him. After a few punches were thrown, I started to worry. The glass in the room only showed the top half. I can only see the Erasers bouncing up and down as they beat the kid. Then I heard something shocking.

"Get the hell off me!" No, it wasn't the mature language he was using that shocked. It was the fact he'd said something. Anything. Experiments were brought in from infancy and for the most part, never learned more than the words food and ow. This boy here said an entire sentence. The Eraser guards looked at each other and shrugged.

"I guess their taking in older kids now," one said. "Hey Muzz? What do you think the whitecoats are doing this for?"

_Good question._ Muzz shrugged. The other one pointed at me.

"How come she can talk," he said.

"She escaped early on, moron. She learned. Is she awake?" Muzz asked. Moron cocked his head to peer inside. My eyes closed as I lay down and I took slow deep breaths. Moron nodded.

"Good, because I heard something strange," Muzz said. _Interesting._ "They're doing something new here. You know why we're getting female Erasers?" I could barely keep my tail from twitching.

"No."

"They're going to start a breeding program when we all come of age," Muzz said. My eyes snapped open, I calmly kept my breathing steady so they would think I was asleep. _Go on._ "We're all going to be getting some!" Moron started to slobber.

_Males... _This was bad.

"Oh man!"

"Yeah, they'll be crossing breeds and starting pure breeds. You know, stuff like that," Muzz explained.

"Crossing breeds? Like mixing us with the turtle girl or something?"

"No. The kitty is what reminded me. They're going to try the mixing the kitties and the doggies," Muzz said. My eyes widened. Jason was the first thing to come to mind. I was sixteen and technically able to breed. So was he.

"Oh no," I mouthed. Jason would just love that, wouldn't he? Another way to make my life miserable. Moron giggled.

"Oh man. How many cats are there?"

"Six. Most of the are too young though," he said. _Most of them. Not me though._ Six cats. There were six others like me in here. The poor things.

"What about the birds? The ones that are outside," Muzz said. My brow furrowed. There were others outside. Winged ones. I'd heard about them. But that was three years ago. They were still out there? They were still being hunted? They were still alive?

"Who cares? They're long gone. If they get caught there's going to be little mercy from me. I still got a scar from those birds." Bird kids were out there together. Birds together. A flock. Why couldn't I be out there? Maybe with these other cats. A pack! No, dogs were packs. A pride! My pride.

My lips curled into the first genuine smile since I was with my family. Then something weird happened. There was a rumbling in my throat that tickled. My smile only grew. I was purring!

Then they had to go and ruin my fun. Apparently they'd been bored and heard my purrs. Suddenly my cage was knocked on my side. I toppled over from my comfortable position and there went all sounds of happiness.


	3. Quest for the Pride

Like so far? Doesn't really matter if you do or not. I just want to write. But if you like it, great! Whoop dee doo! If you don't, why are still reading this?

The next morning I awoke. I can't believe I could've slept at all last night with my new mission in mind. Muzz and Moron were in the corner half asleep. They were hard to wake up. Wolves don't have to worry about animals attacking them in their sleep. So they aren't as skittish as any other animals. Now was my chance. God help me. I was going to try again and I was going to take others with me. Like the birds.

My hand went transparent, and then the rest of me. I silently slipped through the door of the cage. The lights weren't even on yet. But the smell of dew hit my nose telling me it was definitely morning. I smiled wryly.

_Here we go. Get ready for the pounce._ I was all the way through the door. Nothing attacked. There was no swarm of Erasers, no whitecoats with cattle prods. I was so happy I could have giggled, but I didn't dare push my luck.

I was still ghostly when I walked through the opposite wall. No alarms. No flashing red lights. There was still nothing. I guess these whitecoats weren't morning people. I trotted happily through the aisle looking from side to side.

Now where were my fellow felines? I smiled at the thought giddily. Fellow felines. I was going to have friends like me!

Suddenly something squawked loudly. A twelve year old kid with a bill for a mouth. He was naturally red with green and blue arms. I smiled and held a finger to my lips, gesturing for him to be quiet. But parrot kid would have none of that.

"Squawk!" I jumped and gasped at the suddenness of his shrill cry in the quiet morning and _right in the middle of my daring escape of all times!_

"Shut up!" I hissed. My words must've frightened him. He jumped at his cage and tried to rake me with his talon covered feet. Mutants up and down the aisle started to wake up. I tensed and started to shrink back. I could still slink back into my crate. No one would even know I was gone...

No! No going back! This is your chance! Do you really want to be Jason's mate? I snapped to attention like a soldier in battle. No, I didn't. There was no other option suddenly. Then an idea struck me. I would be harder to catch if I'm not the only mutant out. I'd be doing plenty of mutants a good service. Not just the felines.

I started toward the end of the hallway and started to unlock the cages. I think that was when things started to go downhill. The animal people went crazy! Chirping, screaming, barking, even that turtle girl couldn't keep her mouth shut!

So I doubled my speed. Erasers were coming out of their rooms in a frenzy. Animals were running all over the School. Talk about your rude awakenings. Whitecoats were running after ani-people, Erasers were running into each other snapping at each other. Chaos has never been more beautiful. Mom and Dad would be proud.

I ran aimlessly scratching my way past others, doing anything to stay above the chaos and think clearly to find the others. An Eraser tried to pull my into battle. I reached for the nearest kid, which turned out the be some poor fox-kid who'd gotten in my way. I shrugged my apologies and dragged him by his shoulders, right in between me and that Eraser.

Suddenly I stopped. There was a large roar behind me. One that called to my instincts and shook the ground I was standing on. It was definitely a cat. I ran in the direction it'd come from.

_Come on, kitty. Meow for me again, _I thought desperately as I ran towards where I'd thought the sound had come from. Another roar. Suddenly there was a large kid about twice my size charging at me with leather gray skin and a horn where his nose should be. He ran clumsily, with his massive bulk slamming into the sides of the walls that crumbled.

I held my ground as he charged and tossed Erasers and ani-kids alike aside. I crouched to my more comfortable position on all fours ready to jump.

He was charging blindly. And he was charging at me. Time to put those cat genetics to use. I crouched low to the ground feeling my claws slide through the folds in my skin. He kept running. At the right time I pounced over him. Claws scraped his hide for balance then I landed softly on the floor behind him.

"Sorry!" I said realizing that was the second kid I'd hurt for my own well being today. Not a good start. But his hide was thick and I don't think he felt anything. Sliding passed other mutants and swerving out of whitecoat's grasp I went into a room that sounded like a place where the roar came from. I burst into the door and saw a massive, hulking, golden guy clinging to bars. He had incredibly long hair everywhere and a mane around his neck. A lion like me.

"Hey there, big guy. You want out?" I asked in coaxing voice. He responded by walking to the cage door. I unlocked it and opened it. He stared at me confused as if we were saying, _Why are you doing this?_

"Me and you are the same," I said pointing to me and him. I waved for him to follow and headed toward the door. He was outrageously tall, towering over me completely. When I got back on all fours he looked even more confused. He obviously didn't run like me. I blushed knowing that I didn't look like everyone else crawling on the ground, but it was the fastest way to get around. I darted away. The guy who looked to me like a golden version of the hulk ran after me anyway. We came back into the hallway where everyone was running around like crazy. I was too fast and I started to lose him so I got up on two feet and started to run with him.

When I met his gaze he looked at me for leadership. The look on his face said it all. _Great. Now what do we do?_

"We need more cats," I said to him even though he couldn't understand. "Cats like us." Another sound made me stop abruptly. I held up my hand to stop him and listened closely in the midst of the chaos. He lifted his head and sniffed the air. What was that? There was a cry of a little girl. Then the high pitched roar of a jaguar or leopard. The lion boy charged passed me. I smiled proudly. Of course this was going to work. This boy already cared for his pride.

We ran toward the sound to rescue the rest of us.

Yay! More soon...


	4. Let's Blow This Taco Stand!

I don't own Maximum Ride. But these characters I do own. So yeah...

My fellow lion went to a room that was already smashed in by the rhino boy. I saw his body tense. He immediately bared his teeth at his opponents inside. I grinned as I caught up with him. See how protective he is? This has to work! He knows we need each other even if he's never met us before. Am I a genius or what?

"That's it," I said behind them happy that he was getting the picture. I walked inside and saw a white coat with an electric rod panicking and sticking them in each cage.

"Calm down! All of you!" he kept screaming. He stuck it inside a cage and struck a little seven year old girl with kitty ears sticking out her head. She had slit green eyes and straight white hair like an old woman. The girl squealed as it touched her skin and cowered in the back of her cage. In a panic the whitecoat prodded her again. "I said calm down!"

Below her cage was another kid about twelve years old, who was shaking her cage and shouting. She had black hair that flowed to her back, and short black cat-like fur everywhere else. Like one big hairy person. When her eyes opened I saw they were yellow. Those poor mutants. I couldn't help but stop to gasp at these children. I shook my head of my hesitation and forced myself to start on protecting my pride.

I leapt on top of the whitecoat and struck with one swipe of the paw. He suddenly fell.

I scrambled away from him and stood, afraid I may have killed him. He'd fainted. Not only that. A dark spot started to appear on his khaki pants. And he'd peed himself. At this giggled uncontrollably. Oh this was starting to get fun. Then I unlocked the kitten's cage and then the panther's.

They jumped out and stared at me and the other lion kid. Instantly I felt the need to mother. I crouched down to a more comfortable position to reach their height.

"Are you okay?" I asked. The seven year old stared at me, her green slitted eyes welled up. Sobs caught her breath as she hiccupped in my face.

Then kitten started to cry. I don't know if you've ever seen a traumatized child cry, but oh my gosh! I couldn't help it. My heart broke completely. I leaned down and hugged her. That poor kid! The panther girl jumped into our group hug. The feeling of security was overwhelming. I'd never felt anything like it before. Not even with my own family. There was such release and sincerity.

I was suddenly very glad about the decision I'd made. A pride was a very good thing. Then gigantic arms hugged all around us adding to the embrace. The lion boy. I laughed happily.

"Come on. We got two more," I said. The rest of them agreed silently. The panther got through the door first. With all the chaos happening there were fights everywhere. I looked around for the most inconspicous way to edge around all the fights between Erasers, ani-people, and whitecoats. Before I could make my calculations, the panther jumped on top of a whitecoat. The whitecoat cried out surprised and stumbled to the ground.

"Uh uh. No fights for you, girl. We're leaving," I scolded grabbing her arm and pulling her in the other direction. She followed obediently to my surprise. I looked back and found the kitten was in the lion's arms as he jogged to keep up with us.

Suddenly I saw someone familiar. The tiger had escaped in the chaos. He ran passed two Erasers who were ironically fighting each other, snapping jaws and barking like they were squaring off a grudge. When he got closer, I didn't just see him. There was something in his arms. A baby. I staggered in hesitation again. My head was whirling. A baby! Could I..._we_ take care of a baby? Then I realized how it would be harder to leave a fellow feline behind than it would be to raise a child. A spur of the moment decision, like everything then was that day.

"Hey!" I yelled starting to go faster. He looked up and I waved my arms. The panther girl mimicked me. The tiger boy got the same hypnotized look I felt go on my face. He saw someone like him. He nearly collapsed with relief. We continued running until he came up to us.

"Do you want to escape with us?" I asked lamely. I should have said something cooler, like 'Let's blow this taco stand!', but I didn't. It wasn't appropriate for such a delicate situation. When it came to escaping the pits of hell you were raised in there was no room for being cool. It was just time to leave. He nodded silently. He was younger than me. But wasn't really a kid. He was a teenager like me and the lion. Lost, but filled with new hope as we united for the first time. "Follow us!"

I glanced at the baby. Two things surprised me there:

A) It was peacefully asleep in the tiger's arms.

B) It wasn't mutated.

I suppressed a gasp. Okay, I could handle this. We all could. We were a pride. _Just take it and run!_

So we ran. We turned down the other hall. At the end of the hallway was a sign that said, "Employees Only" Sorry, sign. Not today. We reached the door. Locked. Typical. I hit it with my shoulder. It only made the alarms go off. Not like it mattered now. I backed away ready to try to ram it again.

Before I could get ready to charge it another time lion boy suddenly whizzed passed me and slammed it. I heard a crack that made me cringe. I thought it was his shoulder shattering. It definitely wasn't, the door popped out of the door frame like it didn't even have hinges. "Whoa," I said to myself. Lion picked up the kitten again and we all started running down the stairs. Whitecoats came tumbling down the stairs. But they had guns.

Tranquilizing guns.

"Go! Go!" I shouted like they needed to be told. We came down together. Panther slipped with a scream. Instinctively I reached for her furry hand and held it the rest of the way down. At the bottom, Panther opened the door and then a miracle happened. There was an SUV right there.

I don't care what you say. I believe in karma. I wasn't sure what, but I did something very good.

My dad had taught me how a car worked, though I'd never tried it. But whatever fate gives you, don't question it I suppose. I opened the door silently thanking the gods that it was open. We jumped in and I saw at the driver's seat. Suddenly my joy faded. Keys. I didn't have keys! I flipped down the sun shade scrambling for something. A key? An on button? A paper clip? Anything!

"Erasers!" Tiger yelled. I urged myself to hurry. But hurrying wasn't making a key magically appear. Suddenly Panther got out of her seat and jumped out. There my hopes fell.

"No! Don't!" Maybe being a pride wouldn't work together. They could barely communicate, how could they work together? Panther ran in front of the car. I watched curiously. She leaned on the hood placing her head on the metal. She looked as though she were bowing down before God. Or hugging the car. But then suddenly her fingers clenched, the car jolted to life and at once it was humming beneath us. She got back in the car and tapped me on the shoulder alerting me wordlessly to get the hell out of here. I recovered as quickly and started fumbling over the gear shift. The whole time my thoughts were whirling with excitement.

She had a power just like I did.

A whitecoat burst through the door and shot blinding. The dart shattered through the glass and stuck me in the shoulder. No time to react. I backed the car, not looking behind me.

THUMP!

Suddenly there was one less Eraser in the world. I heard someone giggle in the backseat which was an odd thing to do when you're running for dear life and you've probably just killed someone. Oh well. It's not like they didn't deserve it. It was self defense!

The car drove across the desert where the sun was slowly rising. I floored it. My eyes were focused entirely on the road. I didn't have the attention to spare. I didn't even realize that there was no one shooting at us. My grip tightened on the steering wheel for fear that it would jump out of my hands and leave us to die.

_Have to get away. Have to get away..._

A hand touched my shoulder.

"We got away," said a calm voice. My head whipped around and I saw the tiger boy staring at me. "Don't drive so fast. The police will pull us over." I looked at the speedometer. I was going a hundred and ten. I gently eased off the gas pedal and a breath of relief escaped me as slowly as the slowing car. Then we were down to ninety miles per hour.

And now the real fun begins...


	5. Sesame Street's Biggest Fans

Freedom! I don't own any of James Patterson's awesome story or characters. I'm just playing with them for a while. I promise I'll give them right back. But these particular characters are mine.

"They let us go," Tiger said. I blinked in confusion.

"Why?" He shrugged. I didn't like not knowing the answer to that question. I did not like that at all. I shook my head of the thought to focus on the here and now instead of wondering. "Is everyone okay?" I looked in the rearview mirror. Everyone's claws were digging into the expensive leather seats. Their faces horrified and confused. "Oookay," I mumbled.

We kept going along down the road silently. No one knew what to say or do. What do you do with fellow refugees? It'd been nearly three hours and we were now in some town. I had no idea where we were and we were out of gas.

I pulled into some gas station and parked in almost diagnol in a parking space.

"Okay, let's get out here," I said. One by one doors opened and now of all times the baby started to cry. Tiger held the baby and looked at me.

"Where did you get this baby?" I asked him.

"I found him in one of the labs. They already injected him with stuff," he said. "He was labeled Taz and it said he was some sort of cat. I decided to run away, so I thought I should take him with me. He couldn't have gotten out by himself." He handed the baby boy to me. I held him and the pride began to surround me, or more specifically him.

"So his name is Taz?" I asked. Tiger nodded. "That's a weird name. What's your name?"

"Eric," he said. Lucky him. He was the only one of us that got a normal name.

"My name's Cat," I said with a smile. Eric smiled. Then he looked at lion.

"What's your name?" Eric asked. He didn't answer. You could tell he was trying to though. His lips were moving, he was trying to think of something to say that would make sense but he couldn't. He never learned.

"They can't talk," I told Eric. Eric looked at me and then at Taz.

"So...What are we supposed to do now?" Eric asked. I expertly dodged the question by bouncing the baby in my arms and walking over to a curb to sit down. Kitten sat next to me and tried to hug me again. Panther sat down on my other side looking at me eagerly. Like I was supposed to have the answer? Suddenly I realized something, we were out in the open. A bunch of freaks with tails, claws, and fur.

"We need to get ourselves somewhere where normal people can't see us," I said quickly. The little baby wailed in my arms, the sound was numbingly painful as he decided to muffle his face in my hair right beside my sensitive ears. I winced and bounced him again. Taz wouldn't stop crying though.

Where _were_ we going to go? Then I heard something. I stood up forcing the kitten girl away for just a moment so I could see. With Taz in my arms I poked my head over the wall. There was a home right behind the gas station.

"I'm leaving you!" said a woman carrying a baby in her arms and a suitcase in her other hand. A man followed after her.

"Oh no, you're not," he shouted charging after her. Lion poked over the wall too, being that he was the only other one tall enough to see over it. Eric stayed with the two younger girls behind us. The woman turned around.

"This is the last time you hit me! I've called the cops on you," she said bravely. As if on cue, the cops pulled up. The woman got into her own car and drove away. The policemen cuffed the man and took him away within a few minutes. Leaving their house was empty.

See? What'd I tell you? I must have done something very good to deserve this kind of luck. I smiled and looked at the lion boy. I nodded to him.

"Cool," I said.

"Cool," he mimicked which surprised me for a moment. I turned and looked at the others.

"Okay, come on," I said. "We have a new house." Eric cocked his head and me. I led them around the wall and passed the gate to the couple's old home. The door was still halfway open. With Taz in my arms we stepped inside. I ushered in the panther and kitten girl inside. With Taz still crying, of course.

"Relax and make yourself at home," I said shutting the door behind us. There was overturned furniture and dishes sprawled across the linoleum floor. "Eric, could you go find diapers or something?" I asked. He nodded and went cautiously exploring in the back of the house. Lion was wandering into the living room and I followed him with the girls close behind.

Finally he decided to sit on the ground. Unsure of what else to do. We all followed his example. I sat over cross legged and looked at Taz in my arms. My brows went knitted with worry. How was I going to take care of a baby? How was I going to take care of these other cats?

Then without warning the kitten girl reached over and clung to my waist. I think she's wanted to hug something for a long time. Her hug gave me new confidence. I sat up straight and cleared my throat for attention.

I pointed to myself. First thing was first. These kids needed to learn how to talk.

"Cat. I am Cat," I said. I pointed to Kitten.

"I am...?" I said trying to get her to finish the sentence. She looked at me with the sweetest smile.

"Cat!" she shrieked and obviously excited that she was learning. I laughed and shook my head. I pointed to myself.

"Cat." Then I pointed to her. She didn't say anything. Okay, so no one gave her a name. I pointed to the panther.

"You are..." I began. Her black furry face went blank as she tried to think. She looked at the ground and scratched her ear. She gasped suddenly and looked up.

"Cat!" she laughed. I rubbed my brow in slight frustation. This was going to be hard. Eric came back with a diaper.

"Oh, thank God," I sighed. I started to change Taz when I realized that it was exactly what he was crying about. "Thanks." As soon as I figured out the puzzle that was the diaper Taz suddenly stopped crying and smiled at me. I smiled back at him.

"I think we need to stay together you know. Like a lion's pride?" I said to Eric personally since he was the only person who could really understand me. Eric agreed.

"What else would we do?" he asked. I nodded.

"Good point. Okay then. We need to teach these guys to talk. None of them have names," I said. Taz gurgled as I fumbled with his awkward clothes that were given to us at the School. I shivered at the thought of that horrible place. It was over, I reminded myself. Eric sat beside kitten and looked at her. She stared back at him.

"What should we name her?" he asked.

"What do you think?" I said to him. Eric tapped his chin is thought.

"She's really little," Eric said. "She looks like she was made from a regular house cat. Let's just call her Kitten." I nodded. Taz was squirming in my lap trying to get out. Lion held out his hands offering to hold him. I smiled gratefully and handed him.

Then I pointed to her.

"Kitten," I said.

"Kitten," she repeated. "I am...Kitten." I was so relieved. Eric and I exchanged happy glances. Maybe this wasn't going to be so hard. I reached around and hugged her.

"Great job!" I said.

"Great job," said the panther girl nudging her mock-sister with her elbow praisingly. Kitten grinned gratefully. I looked at her.

"What about you?" I said. Eric went and sat right in front of the black panther girl. He was in the center the little circle we made right in front of her. She looked at him oddly, tensing at the same time. She looked to me for support obviously not liking being the center of attention.

"She's covered in fur. She must be mostly panther. Or leopard. Or whatever she is," Eric said. Something about his tone made her frown. She let out a hissing sound.

"She sure is feisty," I said half-admiring.

"I got a name," he said. Something about the way he said it made it seem like he wasn't going to say something nice. But he surprised me. "Salem. My mom had a cat like her. I hated that thing."

"Well, you're not hating her," I told Eric. "We need to get along here."

"I'll be nice," he said almost in a whine. I looked at her and pointed to her chest.

"Salem," I said.

"Salem. I am Salem," she said catching on our own little ritual. She pointed to each one of us. "Cat, Kitten, Salem." I nodded and patted her hand.

"At least they learn quick," I said to Eric. Kitten nodded.

"Mmm, quick," she agreed. I giggled girlishly at her cuteness. Then I turned to the lion. It was strange seeing a person that was your age or older who couldn't speak. He looked at me with his golden eyes and then back at Taz. The baby reached up and pet his long mane. Lion gently took his hand away.

"And you," I said looking at him. He shifted Taz in his arms. He opened his mouth and closed it again, obviously wanting to respond. "You're going to be Tarzan. You talk enough like him." He looked around and then at me.

"Tarzan? I am Tarzan?" he said. I nodded and Eric seemed to agree.

"Sounds appropriate," Eric said. So we all learned each other's names. That night Eric decided to make some macaroni and cheese. He was the only one of us that knew how to work a stove. I fished around through some videos and found a giant tape collection of Sesame Street. Thank everything that is holy!

So I popped some of those suckers in the old VCR and went into the kitchen with Eric and Taz. I watched through the doorway as the rest of the pride were captivated by the television.

"Eric," I said sitting at the table.

"Hmm?" he responded distracted by stirring the contents in the pot.

"Exactly how are you able to talk?" I asked. He swallowed hard and looked at me with sad eyes.

"You were all born at the School. I was brought there four years ago," he said. My jaw dropped.

"What?" I asked unbelievably.

"My mom worked at the School. I didn't know what she did at the time. She died in a car accident and I was left alone. No one could find her will. So they left me with this guy who worked for the School. They wanted to DNA test of someone who wasn't a baby. So they used me." He bit his lip and left the wooden spoon in the pot. He was suddenly serious.

"Cat, the Erasers are going to find us if we stay here," he said sure of himself. We all knew that. I glanced at Tarzan, Kitten and Salem planted in front of the television. "What if they have a tracer on the SUV?" I shrugged.

"We'll run," I said.

"But none of us look right. Salem's got black fur on her entire body," Eric said sitting down on a turned over bar stool. Taz had fallen asleep in my lap. "Kitten has cat ears sticking through her hair. We all have tails and you walk on all fours. I have stripes on my skin. How are we going to walk around in public?"

"We'll wear a lot of clothes," I said. "We'll make Salem keep her hands in her pockets and wear a hood. You can too. Kitten can wear a hat. We can wear pants to hide our tails. Tarzan can shave and I can walk on two legs if I want. I'd just rather walk on fours." Eric sighed and finished making dinner.

The sound of the Count, counting to ten was suddenly louder in the other room. Someone had found the volume button.

I put the food on paper plates and walked over to the other three handing it to them.

"Thank you," the all said together in unison. I stopped out of pure shock and turned my head to see the television.

"Please, thank you, and excuse me are the three most important phrases, Elmo," said the woman talking to the red furry puppet. Oooh...

It was time for bed. Tarzan, Salem, and Kitten all automatically threw the oddest fit in the world when I turned off the TV.

"Elmo!" Kitten shrieked stretching out her arms at the screen as though I'd just assassinated the puppet. I turned the television back on to show her he was still there and then off again.

"Sleep," I said. They understood that very much. Salem groaned and tried to turn on the television again. Tarzan grabbed her hand.

"No," he said to her in a big brother voice. She pouted and got up. This was going to be one weird family. I pictured my mom in the kitchen asking me how my day was. _Well, first I started a riot, then I found five kitty kids and pretty much adopted them all, and I'm teaching them to read, write and speak. Oh yeah, look mom. I have a baby now. _

Kitten pushed the reluctant Salem down the hall. Eric and Tarzan stayed in the living room.

Eric picked up a blanket that was draped across the couch and sat in an armchair. He curled up in it with the blanket across him. Tarzan was already stretched out on the couch.

"You guys going to be alright?" I asked with Taz still asleep in my hands. He had his arms around my neck with a death grip on a strand of my hair. Man, that kid slept like a rock.

"Yeah," Eric said.

"Yes," Tarzan said slowly.

"I'm going to sleep in nursery with Taz. There's already a cot in there anyway," I said. They nodded to me. Suddenly I heard crying in the other room along with a big thump. All of us tensed at once. Erasers!

Hope you enjoy! There's more to come.


	6. Fashion a la Cat

Thanks to all you readers. You make my day. I don't own anything related to Maximum Ride. Just these characters.

I went charging down the hall implanting instincts in my head. _Gotta protect the pride. Gotta protect the pride._

I burst through the master bedroom. Salem was on the bed looking astonished. Kitten was at her feet crying and holding her face. Salem bent down and touched Kitten's shoulder.

"Sorry... Sorry," Salem said not knowing what else to say. I climbed on the bed and sat next to the young girl. And pushed back her hair. Kitten had dust and blood on her head and hairline. Salem just looked down horrified. "Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry." She must have felt like we were going to abandon her or something. Because she jumped off the bed and started for the door. I caught Salem by the shoulders and swung her around.

Salem was shaking from crying so hard, soaking the black fur on her face.

"Sorry," she said again. "Really sorry." I gave her a quick hug and walked her over to the bed where Kitten was crying.

"It's okay," I said. "I'm sure it was an accident." Kitten was wailing. I sat her up and moved her up to a sitting position.

"Ow!" she shouted.

"What happened?" Eric asked now in the door way. I shrugged. He looked up and moved in the room and looked up. "Whoa." I looked up. Whoa was right. There was a hole the size of Kitten's head in the high ceiling. I looked to Salem questioningly. Salem patted her head.

"Her head hit the ceiling," I said pointing up. Salem nodded. She jumped on the mattress and pointed up again. "She was jumping and hit her head." Eric laughed.

"She made a clean hole," Eric said. "Wow."

"Wow," Tarzan agreed mimmicking him.

"That's some jump. Maybe we should start calling you Rocket?" I said light heartedly. Kitten sniffled and frowned in response. She was too cute to be called Rocket. Tarzan handed me some toilet paper. "Thank you."

"You are welcome," he answered in plain English. At least Elmo had taught them some manners. I cleaned up Kitten's forehead with the toilet paper and my spit.

"Erasers," Kitten whispered. I froze, then realized she may have learned the word from listening to the whitecoats talk to one another. She was right. What about the Erasers? Everyone had a matching look of concern and fear on their faces. We'd all had our experiences.

"Maybe we should all sleep in here," Eric said voicing everyone's thoughts. I nodded.

"That might be best," I said. Tarzan and I brought the crib inside the room. Taz was asleep before we even put him in the crib. Tarzan and Eric slept on the floor with some extra blankets we found. I slept in the bed with Salem beside me, Kitten insisted on sleeping on the edge of the bed curled up on a ball.

We all slept pretty well considering all day. And we were the cutest darn looking freaks you'd ever seen with us all curled up together like that.

The next day I awoke surrounded by my pride. The most awesome pride you've ever seen. My pride. Taz was cooing in the corner and it sounded like he was blowing spit bubbles. He was fine, I decided and sat in bed looking at the ceiling. Or more specifically the hole that Kitten had made with her amazing jumping powers. I had to keep track of my family. I could go through things, Salem could...do whatever she did with the car, Tarzan seemed to have unlimited strength judging by how easily he'd ripped through the door in our daring escape.

Eric and Taz were still unknown. Taz didn't look like a cat. He was this human kid who, for all we know, might not even have any mutations at all. Maybe he was a dud. I lifted my hand in front of my face. Then I tried to make it transparent. I don't know why. It was probably the first break I'd had since the escape. But it wasn't working.

My brow furrowed. That was weird. I tried again and got nothing. Why wasn't it working? I didn't understand.

"Come on," I whispered frustrated with my powers. "Do it, do it." Apparently, my hand wasn't listening. I was starting to get scared. That power was my ticket to overpowering the Erasers. The could never touch me if I had it. They could never lock me anywhere! Where was it? Suddenly I remembered something. The dart that hit my shoulder when I was driving the SUV. It hadn't put me to sleep, it must have done something else.

My hand went over my wound. Suddenly I heard Taz getting fussy and moving around in his, well not his crib, but the crib we were borrowing. Tarzan was the first one. He poked his head over the edge of the bed from his makeshift bed on the floor. His mane was tossed around and flattened on one side. I smiled a greeting to him and walked Taz quietly to the other room.

"How you doing, kiddo?" I cooed at him. He made a funny noise at me. "Oh, interesting. Are you hungry?" He kicked his legs up in the air and let one rip. I snorted out a laugh suddenly forgetting about all my worries. Family has a way of doing that I supposed.

"I see," I said picking him up and putting him on my shoulder. Tarzan came in the room and watched me pat Taz's back.

"Hello," he said to me. I smiled.

"Hello Tarzan," I returned. "Sleep good?" He nodded like I'd just said something obvious.

"Yes," he laughed. He looked at me as if to say, _Duh, Cat. Or course sleep is good._ That was okay. I knew what I meant.

"You want to watch Sesame Street?" I asked. His ears perked at the words. He nodded quickly. Taz burped and started to fall asleep all over again. Time to get things done for Day 2 outside the School. "First there's something I want to do. You should wait for Salem and Kitten to watch Sesame Street." At the sound of their names he knew he would have to wait and rolled his eyes impatiently. I put Taz back in the crib. Then led Tarzan into bathroom.

"We're going to shave," I announced. I opened the medicine cabinet. _Viola!_ Some shaving cream was already there staring me in the face. He watched me puzzled. I showed him as I put the shaving cream in my hand and lathered it on his mane.

"It's okay. We need to make you look normal," I said. He tensed up when the coolness touched his skin. "It's okay." I took the man's razor and started to shave gently. Once he saw the fur fall, he flipped. He grabbed my hand and knocked me upside the sink with his massive body weight.

"No!" he shouted. His eyes were fiery. I knew how he felt. I'd be afraid too if I never knew what shaving was. A growl came up from his throat in warning. His golden eyes fell into mine and bored down intimidatingly. My breath quickened and my heart rate was wild. But being part of pride required trust. It was me who'd dragged them into this. I had to make it work. I mustered my courage and stuck my face right back in his face.

"Yes!" I shouted back. As horrifying as a seven foot tall muscle man staring down at you, this was something that had to be done. We were still, me still pinned against the sink between the massive older teenager. Our gunslinger moment was interrupted Eric came in and yawned in the bathroom doorway.

"What's going on?" he asked. I pushed myself away from the sink and walked over to Eric grabbing his face and in the process smushed his face together.

"See? No hair. No hair is good, you big caveman," I said as calmly as I could, which admittingly wasn't that calm. His eyes narrowed. Tarzan stepped forward grabbing the razor from my hand. Then with one hand, he pushed me and Eric out of the bathroom and locked the door. It was simple for his strength. We practically went flying into the hallway. Salem was watching through the bedroom door as she blinked tired eyes. Kitten yawned and got out of her cat curl position.

"Sesame Street!" Kitten yelled excitedly.

"Does Sesame Street have this effect on everyone?" I asked Eric over my shoulder.

"I think it's just that they've never watched TV before. Sesame Street is the only show they know about. So Sesame Street equals TV," Eric said. He's a smart kid. I was glad he was here.

"Sesame Street?" Salem said stretching her arms wide.

"Not until Tarzan gets over his temper tantrum," I said turning my head toward the side so he could hear me better. A low growl rumbled from within. Resisting to growl back I decided to do something more productive.

"Can you get breakfast ready?" I asked Eric. "I'm going to go through the clothes in this place. Maybe you can give Salem a lesson. They should all watch Sesame Street together so no one misses anything." He nodded.

"Let's go, Salem," he said. Salem followed him into the kitchen.

Cool! I got my first review! Thanks Barkflow-of-Riverclan! You rock! And this is prewritten so expect many updates.


	7. Hippie Vans and Grocery Store Chicken

I don't own Maximum Ride or anything related. But if I did, I wouldn't change a thing. But these characters are mine

"Let's get some clothes," I said. Kitten just followed me trustingly. I found plenty of baby clothes. Even though they were girl clothes. The last people who lived here must have had a daughter. It took some creativity to make clothes to fit the seven year old. I had to cut some of the woman's pants and told her to put them on. We had to hide Kitten's ears. Luckily the woman had some very cute beanies. I put one of them on Kitten's head.

"Ow!" she said as I flattened her cat-like ears.

"Sorry, hun. But look! You're beautiful," I said. Another word some of the whitecoats had used that she might understand. She looked in the mirror and gasped. I'm telling you, cat's are very full of themselves.

"Beautiful," she whispered in awe of herself.

"Say I am beautiful," I told her hoping to make her start saying sentences. That may not have been the best on to start with.

"I am Kitten?"

"I am Kitten. I am beautiful," I said. She giggled.

"I am Kitten Beautiful," she said triumphantly with her arms in the air. I think she thought she had two names now. I sighed.

"Good enough," I told her. Suddenly the bathroom door opened. Tarzan was out of the bathroom. I poked my head outside the bedroom and looked across the hallway. There he was. Or at least I think it was him. His mane was completely gone. He looked surprisingly...human. Aside from the tail sticking out of his butt. He had a chisled masculine jaw and his eyes had somewhat softened. He looked...dare I say handsome? I mean he looked like Prince Charming or something. Talk about the perfect male specimen.

I smiled at him.

"You look good," I said. His hand reached up and touched his skin. I think he liked the feeling. He shook his head amazed at the wind he could feel on his neck and side burns.

"Thank you," he said rather immodestly, more manners courtesy of Elmo. Seeing that Tarzan was now out of the bathroom Kitten jumped up extremely high and down again. She reminded me of one of those tiny dog's that can jump as high as a full grown man. I had to grab her arm and pull her down before she made another hole in the ceiling.

"Sesame Street!" she shouted. Salem practically came running. Tarzan cooly came down the hall strutting his stuff. Then they planted themselves on the floor. Salem reached up and pressed the on button. I got Taz and walked over to the living room. Tarzan automatically held out his arms to take Taz. Though he could be terrifying, immodest, and strangely attractive he was a very sweet guy when it came down to it. Eric handed Tarzan the bottle, who fed Taz like it was second nature.

Eric and I sat back on the couch paying little attention.

"How long are we going to be here?" he asked softly as to not interrupt the Letter of the Day. I sighed.

"No clue. As long as we can safely, I guess. Then we can take another car. Salem has that weird high jacking power thankfully," I said. Eric nodded to Tarzan.

"He shaved. And Kitten's wearing a beanie," Eric commented on a lighter note. I smiled.

"Yup and I found a black hoodie, pants, and gloves for Salem," I said. I patted his knee. "I think we're going to be okay." Eric gave me a look as he leaned forward, knocking on the wood part of the coffee table in front of us.

"Don't jinx us, Cat," he warned.

By the end of the week Salem, Kitten, and Tarzan were actually talking pretty well. While they learned Eric showed me how to work the stove, which was easier than I thought. We found out what Salem's power was. We had a bit of a power surge in the middle of their watching TV. God forbid anything should get between her and television. She put her hand on the TV screen and it came on again.

Eric says that our brains make electricity and it must have something to do with that. He tried to explain it to me, but let's face it. I never went to school. I could read, write, add, and subtract (sort of), so I didn't really understand his explanation. Not like I told him though. I nodded along as if to say, _Ah yes, of course. _

We were all enjoying ourselves very much playing house with each other. Salem was in her black hoodie and pants. She refused to wear the gloves though. I can't really blame her though. I wouldn't want my claws cooped up in fabric either.

Eric was wearing one of the man's skateboard hooded sweatshirts and pants. Tarzan was wear one of his undershirts with a pair of jeans. I wore jeans and a tank top myself. Taz was in overall's that had flowers on the butt, but we managed to get a white T-shirt. It was the most masculine outfit we could find out of girl baby clothes.

"This is one snazzy group of mutants," I said.

"What does snazzy mean?" Kitten asked.

"Well dressed," I told her. Suddenly we all heard something. Our cat ears perked simultaneously. Kitten put her beanie on her head. The sound of a car door closing. The car was too close. Salem got off the floor and poked her head around the curtains.

"Uh oh," she said. "The Erasers found the car and it looks like they're...Yeah, they're coming this way." I cursed out loud.

"What does that word mean?" Kitten asked.

"Um. I'll tell you later," I said hoping she'd forget after the excitement.

"Okay, guys. It's time to run," I announced. They were on their feet instantaneously. I picked up Taz and held him. "Remember not to let normal people see that you're different. Let's go!" I led the way to the back of the house. I opened the door. There was alreadu an Eraser in my way. He held up his paw ready to slam me down. I slammed the door in his face. A paw slammed through the wood.

"We're trapped," I told them.

"No," Tarzan said. "There's only one." He opened the door and pounced. It's a funny thing seeing a giant ultra strong cat pounce of a giant mutated dog. But there was no time to dwell on that thought.

"Go!" We ran passed him into the backyard. The walls were quickly covered with Erasers in human form. But once they were in the privacy of the backyard they quickly morphed. I handed Taz to Kitten.

"You and Salem run. We'll catch up with you," I said. Kitten nodded. She ran and easily jumped over the wall with Salem climbing the wall with outstretched claws not far behind her. Two Erasers turned to follow her. I got down on all fours and opened my mouth to deliver an ear piercing roar. I leapt on one. The other automatically turned to aid his partner. In the middle of scuffle there was a crash. Eric was thrown through a window. He hit the ground bloodied, but didn't hesitate to roll off the ground right to his feet.

He was the only one of us not in a battle. "Eric, run!" I was tackled as I was momentarily distracted. Suddenly Tarzan jumped with me on my Eraser. Then three more pounced on both of us. I slammed down hard on the ground knocking the wind out of me. My hands were cuffed with claws and a snout came next to my ear.

"I told you this wasn't over," Jason said in my ear. I turned my head and snapped my jaws onto his cold, wet nose. He made a pathetic yipping sound. I rolled around and in one large lion roar Tarzan jumped up shrugging all of the Erasers off of him. He definitely outstrengthened them. It was obviously his strength wasn't natural.

I gave him a nod and he instinctively knew to follow me. I jumped over the backyard wall and landed on all fours.

The Erasers had to turn back to their human forms before stepping out in the public. Frankly I didn't care. Keeping my mutant secret wasn't on the top list of my concerns that moment. Over the gate and into the front yard. We ran out into the street looking both ways unsure of where to go. Suddenly a dumpy old van rolled around the corner.

I grinned proudly. Did my pride know how to improvise or what?

The door opened and Tarzan and I jumped in without even bothering to slow down. I hit the opposite wall hard. Then Tarzan hit me just as hard. I was bruised every where. Okay, maybe he hit me a little bit harder. The car jerked forward and we were thrown to the back with the momentum.

I lifted my head up over the backseat.

"Everyone...here?" I said still trying to catch my breath. Kitten was in the back with us and Taz was in her arms. Salem sat next to Eric who was driving. I let out a huge sigh. "Oh good." I looked out the back window. There was another car behind us swerving when we swerved and following us where we went.

Suddenly I felt the car slowing down.

"Eric?" I asked hesitantly.

"Go!" Salem shouted. He started going as fast as the other cars around us.

"This is no time to be concerned about laws!" I shouted frustrated and crawling the front of the van.

"No, it's the perfect time," he said. I looked out the back window. Behind the black car blue and red lights started to flash. They were being pulled over. I laughed out loud and collapsed with relief.

"Eric, you're a genius!" I shouted.

"I'm holding you to that," he said back to me. "And you'll be happy to hear that all the money that was just lying around the house is now our grocery money." Tarzan and I looked at each other. He had a nice bruise forming on the side of his face.

"You okay?" he asked me. I reached up to feel blood running from my nose.

"Yeah. I'm fine. Are you okay?" I asked. He opened his chest where his shirt was ripped to shreds with lines of blood. Kitten found a torn up beach towel under the seat and handed it to me. I put a claw in the fabric and tore down the middle. He got a piece and so did I to clean ourselves up with.

"Where do we want to go now guys?" I asked. No one answered me. Okay. Another decision up to me. "Um...Head north. There should be thicker forests. We'll be able to hide better." I collapsed on the seat beside Tarzan.

"We got away," he said smiling. "No School." I froze up at the word. School. Of course we got away. There was no chance of me going back there. I knew that's how we all felt.

"No School," I agreed. We had survived our first attack.

We stopped at a grocery store where Eric and I were going to switch places. I was older than him so we decided it would be less suspicious to see a sixteen year old driving than a fourteen year old.

"We should get food," Eric said in the parking lot. I nodded.

"What does everyone want?" I asked.

"Macaroni and cheese!" Kitten responded before I could even bother finishing the question.

"We don't have a stove," Eric said. "They should have some rotisserie chicken or something." I cocked an eyebrow at him. After a minute of trying to explain to me what it was, he decided. "I'll go in and get it."

"Put your hood up, Stripes," I said. He gave a thumbs up. I turned toward the rest of the pride. We found a coat in the back of the van for Tarzan. In the middle of showing him how the zipper works, Kitten started to cry.

"What's wrong?" I asked her. Her large green eyes looked at me in that sad, heartbreaking way that I'd seen her when we had first found her in that dog crate.

"I don't want to go back to School," she said in a tiny voice. Everyone locked up. There was that word again.

"We're not going back to School," I said. Kitten started to cry. I looked to my fellow lion who didn't bother to meet my gaze.Tarzan picked her up and sat her by him. He gently put his arm around her.

"We're not going back," Salem said almost as a question.

"No way," I said. The tension fell out of the air like it had suddenly fallen prey to gravity. It looked like someone had just taken a ton of bricks off Salem's back.

"Dah!" Taz shouted suddenly. We all looked down at him he was reaching out his arms and drool dripped from the sides of his mouth. He squirmed anxiously in Kitten's lap. My sensitive nose picked up a delicious smell. Eric came back and sat in the open door of the van. I nearly died of happiness when I got a whiff of the full aroma.

He took off the lid and laid it down.

"_This _is rotisserie chicken," he said. And it was _so _good.

A little tid bit. I don't really like rotisserie chicken. But whatever. This story isn't about me. Love ya, guys!


	8. Taz's Secret

Author's Note: As per usual, I don't own anything Maximum Ride related, but my own characters. At least... Not yet. Dun, dun dummmmm!

We took yet another car and left a sorry note on the old van. Probably not the smartest thing at the time seeing as how we had whitecoats and Erasers after us, but hey what did we know? We weren't trained to do this sort of thing. No one ever taught us anything with the exception of me knowing how the read and write and Eric having a fourth grade education.

The new car was on the side of the road with a for sale sign on it. Sorry whoever's it was, but this was an emergency. We stopped in a few towns switching off cars every time we needed gas since we had no money and none of us knew how to pump gas even if we did have the money. Everyone was being tough, which I was extremely grateful for. Each of us took turns taking care of Taz. He slept a lot, but when he was awake he was the most energetic thing you'd ever seen.

The six of us continued on the road for what seemed like forever. But it was about three days. After a few days of drving in circles and arguing over a map that we could barely read. The compact car we took, though it was cramped, had lots of money it the glove box. Two twenties!

"We're going to eat like royalty tonight gang!" I shouted. We all cheered happily. Everyone was excited. Eric put his hand on my shoulder.

"Shouldn't we be saving our money?" he asked. My happiness faded. He was right. I hate being responsible.

"No, Cat! I wanna eat good food tonight!" Salem said. I looked at her apologetically. She punched Eric in the arm. "Happy? Now we have to have apples for dinner again."

"Ow!" Eric whined rubbing his shoulder.

"Hey!" I shouted. "Save it for the Erasers." Salem rolled her eyes. A nice little characteristic she picked up from yours truly. I was beginning to regret it as it was her new favorite gesture.

"What are we going to spend it on?" Tarzan asked with arms folded across his chest. I ran my hand through my knotted hair.

"Let's go buy some things we need. Like food that will last us a long time. And razors for Tarzan and diapers for Taz. We'll get food, but not McDonald's. Grocery store food," I said.

"I like McDonald's and it's cheaper," Salem whined.

"But it doesn't last as long. And if we're eating at McDonald's you get to change Taz," I said. That was the end of that argument. Salem kept her mouth shut. Kitten looked out the window of the car and pointed.

"Cat! Look!" I looked across the street. There was a for sale house. It was dusty and abandoned.

"Looks like a real fixer upper. And it's been on the market for two years," I said. Tarzan looked at me.

"No one's in there," he said catching on.

"Like our first house," Kitten said entusiastically. We crossed the street and tried the door. Nothing. Eric stepped forward.

"Hold on. Let me try something," he said. He stuck out his finger with a claw and started jiggling the handle. We waited quietly as he picked the locks. Suddenly the door opened. Kitten squealed happily. She jumped up at the amazing height only she could reach and giggled. Tarzan caught her in mid air and put her back on the ground.

There was no furniture, a stove, and rat feces everywhere in our house. But it was our house.

We spent a few weeks hiding there. Salem kept the place running, literally, with a few jolts of electricity. We spent our night scrounging around for crap to put inside and try to make our house a home. We got paintings to hang in the house. A beanbag chair with a hole in it. A bassinet that's too small for Taz (but he sleeps there anyway.) Blankets, the essentials, a broom, and a radio.

Like vampires we ventured into the night and returned before dawn.

Meanwhile, we had some time to kill. I taught the others how to fight like a human, the way my mom taught me. Eric told us stories about how the world works. He told us stories of movies he'd seen. Most of what he told us I didn't even know. It was kind of demeaning having a kid two years younger than you have the most education, but he was getting the job done. I had to pretend like I knew what he was talking about all the time. Luckily I'm a good liar.

They mostly were along these lines:

"Yeah, I know how to multiply!"

"School? Sure! I went to school."

"Of course I know what we're doing!"

Or something like that.

The lies flowed out of my mouth like I'd been lying my whole life.

Otherwise things at our knew house were fine. Everyone was alive and surprisingly chipper. Salem and Eric got into a few scraps, but for the most part we always got along.

One day Salem was at the kitchen table chewing on a granola bar. (I'm not going to say where we got it. Let's just say our food supply is completely free)

"Catty," she said using my knew nickname that was quickly gaining popularity.

"Yeah Sale?"

"I have something I think I should tell you," she said. She was serious as ever. So I sat down beside her. "You remember the story, Jurassic Park, that Eric told us? Well, I think the...place we came from was doing something like that." My eyebrows lifted.

"I was kept in a place where they did weird stuff because of my power with electricity. There were other animal people there too," she said. I saw tears brim her eyes. She obviously had some terrible memories of the tests done on her. "One day they passed my cage through this place. There was these eggs and really excited people everywhere. I saw a picture of a dinosaur on the wall and a guy was pointing to it with a long silver stick. I don't know what he was saying, except for Erasers."

"They were exactly how Eric said they were?" she nodded. It was time to stop beating around the bush. We needed to talk about what the School was doing. If I had information about the school, then everyone else might have information too. "Everyone! In the kitchen. We're having a Pride Meeting!" Slowly everyone started pouring into the room. We sat on the floor together in a circle in our furnitureless house. I had Salem repeat the information.

"A new type of Eraser?" Eric said skeptically. "And they're dinosaurs."

"Sort of," Salem interrupted. "They were dino-kids." My brows furrowed in confusion.

Dino-kids? I shook my head to switch my focus from wondering how the hell, or why the hell they had done that. You gotta play with the hand you're given.

"That's right," I said. "New hunters. Does anyone know anything else about School? This could be very important even though it may not seem like it now." Then I remembered something. The breeding program.

"I know something," I said. I told them about the breeding program. How they wanted to mix cats and Erasers. I purposely left out my beef with Jason. There was no need to tell them that he was the reason I'd finally gotten the guts to run away. Right?

"Breed? Like they're gonna mix our DNA?" Salem asked naively. I glanced at Eric.

"Something like that," I said. He and Tarzan suddenly had the same realizing expression. There was no question with them exactly how the breeding would actually go. "Anyone else?" There was a moment of silenceTaz crawled out of Eric's lap and into the center of the circle. We ignored his antics which had become second nature. You can only coo at a baby for so long before its cuteness wears off.

Taz did not like the lack of attention. "Dah!" he yelled with his arms in the air. "Dah, dah!"

"That was why I ran away," I continued. "They have this brilliant idea to mix Erasers with cats. So when I escaped I decided to take all of you with me. Can you imagine? Eraser cats?"

"That's disgusting," Tarzan said. "No way in hell I'm letting my genes be used for that."

"My thoughts exactly," I said.

"DAH! DAH!" Taz yelled over our voices demanding our attention. We all stopped and stared. The little baby closed his fist and eyes tight. His face was turning red, and started to go purple.

"Taz, baby, you okay?" I cooed. His face was an unnatural color. I gasped starting to be afraid for my little guy. I started to reach for him when fur suddenly sprout from his cheeks. I pulled my hand back. A tail shot out from his diaper.

Author's note: What's wrong with Taz? Let's find out.


	9. Never Turn Your Claws On Your Own

Author's Note: Still don't own Maximum Ride. But don't worry. I'm working on it. Look! I found the page break tool!

* * *

"What's wrong with Taz?" Kitten asked worried. Together we started to back away. A snout came from his nose and from the snout came jutted teeth. He ground a juvenile version of a growl that we had all come to fear. All five of us were wide eyed and terrified. Our trust shattered...

"He's an Eraser!" Tarzan shouted. "I thought you said he was some sort of cat like us, Eric!" Eric's claws were digging into the floor in fear.

"I thought he was!" Eric said defensively. Muscles bulged from his baby fat and fur sprouted everywhere. He ripped his clothes off, squealing at the same time. Then he lunged at us. We ran in different directions as Taz ran after us. This baby was running after us. But we weren't about to fight him. I took Tarzan's lead as he got up and ran toward the other end of the house. We all ran into the master bedroom and slammed the door. Tarzan held it closed, but Taz was ripping at the door with his claws.

"Little Taz is an Eraser!" Kitten shouted. "But-" We all knew what the 'but' was. But he was one of us. He was just a baby. How could he be one of them? The door stopped shaking. The roar slowed down. There was a final pound at the door that shook under even Tarzan's weight that was pressed on the door. It was quiet for a second. No one dared to move. Then there was the sound of sniffling a stuffy nose. Taz started to cry.

I looked at the rest of them. They were standing still and listening. There was no more barking. Only a sad little baby's cry.

"Open the door," I told Tarzan.

"What if he attacks us!" Salem screeched.

"He's still a part of our pride," I said knowing that our trust could not be broken. I could repair this. Even if I wasn't so sure myself about Taz, I had to pretend like I did. If they saw that I could trust him, they would know that I wasn't going to let something ruin this Pride so soon. This was a hiccup in the big plan.

But still, I wasn't so sure.

Tarzan nodded and opened the door. Taz was on his butt crying with his eyes closed, when he saw us he stopped. And stared right back at us. His lips quivered at us.

Eric cocked his head to the side. "He looks sort of..."

"Sorry," Kitten finished. Yes, that was it. I knelt down beside him. He opened his mouth to growl at me. My finger tapped his nose.

"No," I ordered. Taz stopped and began to change into his old self. I stepped back to let him finish the transformation. I picked him up in his arms and he hugged me around my neck. I let out a quiet sigh of relief

"Well, at least now we know why they call him Taz," Eric muttered.

"How are we supposed to take care of an Eraser?" Tarzan asked. He followed me to the nursery we'd set up for Taz and I plopped him down in his bassinet.

"The same way we've been caring for him so far," I said. "He's not any different than when we picked him up. I don't care if he's the spawn of evil. Taz is still our baby, he's counting on us to take care of him." I looked back in the doorway where the other's were watching me. Suddenly Taz grabbed my hand and started to gently play with my fingers.

"Dah," he said happily. He opened his mouth to gum my finger and I pulled away tapping his nose lightly to show him he couldn't do that. Not anymore.

"Besides, if he's with us, he's not going to learn to be an Eraser," I said.

"Cat, he attacked us," Eric said. Kitten took a brave step inside and peered down at Taz.

"He's sorry," Kitten said. That was Kitten for you. Ever the optimistic one. She would give anyone a great big hug on a whim whether it was Mother Teresa or Hitler. Taz looked up at her with loving brown eyes and blew a spit bubble. Salem stood next to her in agreement. Eric shook his head and turned around. I narrowed my eyes. No one was going to hold a grudge against anyone here. Not in my Pride.

"Eric, please tell me you still care about this baby," I said hopefully. Eric turned around.

"He's one of them," was all he said.

"Taz is a baby! He's not on anyone's side yet," I said.

"Yeah and I suppose he's also too young to go completely ballistic and try to kill us!" Eric yelled. He perked up in mock realization. "Oh! That's right! He just did." Tarzan came out into the hallway.

"Hey, you guys..." he said.

"If you care about the Pride so much, then protect us," Eric said pointing an extended finger and claw at me. My eyebrows raised. Was that a challenge?

"He is part of the pride!" I shouted. I shouldn't have shouted. I know that.

"He's not part of a pride! He's part of a pack of mutant dogs!" he yelled baring his teeth. My whole body clenched. "He's one of the ones who can turn you into the School. Who can turn you over to the mercy of Jason."

The world stopped on its axis.

How did he know about Jason? I felt a vein throb in my temple and my eyes dilated. A growl escaped my throat, and encouraged a growl of his own.

"Guys..." Tarzan warned. I was blind to him. Eric's round blue eyes were all I could see. Slowly I crouched on all fours, my muscles coiling beneath my skin. Jason was not my mate. He never would be. I'd sooner choose a whitecoat to be my mate. Suddenly someone dropped an anvil on my back. No wait, it wasn't an anvil. It was Tarzan.

"Get off of me!" Eric tried to join our pile, his eyes fixated on me. Salem and Kitten jumped on him together to prevent him from reaching me

"Let go!"

Tarzan sat on my back. I twitched my tail anxiously, eyes locked onto the tiger's eyes. Nothing could stop his swearing like an Osbourne. I was barely able to breath under Tarzan's weight. Salem clapped a furry hand over his mouth.

"Settle. Down. Both of you," Tarzan barked in an intimidating voice. To my surprise I obeyed without question. "I am shocked. You two were the ones who made the pride work. Now you two are the ones who are going to tear it apart?" I stopped squirming. Was I really tearing up the pride? I'd tried to attack Eric. I'd been the first to turn claws on one of my own at the first mention of Jason. He was right. What was I doing?

My eyes softened and so did Eric's.

"Taz is going to stay whether either of you like it or not," Tarzan continued. "Right girls?" Salem and Kitten nodded.

"There's no fighting between us. Ever," Salem said.

"Yeah," Kitten said.

"Can we trust you both enough to get off of you?" Tarzan asked in a fatherly tone that made me feel like I'd just disappointed my parents. Maybe I had. I nodded. Eric nodded too. Salem and Kitten got off Eric quickly. Tarzan rolled off of me and stood up. Eric and I looked at each other.

"I'm sorry," I said to him straightening out my clothes and trying to regain a leader's posture.

"Me too," he responded.

"We'll compromise," I said authoritively. "If Taz proves life threatening to anyone in the pride, we'll take him somewhere safe. At a laboratory or something where scientists can look at him and treat him right. Until then, he is still ours and we treat him no differently."

Eric looked down on the floor. He wasn't so sure, I could see that. But he was ashamed that he wasn't so sure. He felt like I did. We wanted it to work.

"Okay," he said. Suddenly Tarzan leapt between us and put his arms around us destroying the tension with his massive strength.

"Great. Group hug!" he joked. Eric and I couldn't help but smile under his nasty sweaty pits.

* * *

Whoo! Yay. Another one down. I'm getting close to the end of the prewritten stuff. Then I'm going to start writing on my own which means I will not be updating nearly as often. However, I will keep updating which is all that matters. 


	10. Say Cheese!

Hey! Here's a new chapter because I'm so nice! I don't own Maximum Ride. Just these guys in this story.

* * *

So far our hiding in the house for sale was going pretty well. There was a little hostility between Eric and Taz at first, but Eric was starting to ease up. Wait, no. That's a lie. (See. I told you I'm a good liar.) Eric avoided Taz at all costs. If Taz needed to be fed or changed, Eric was conveniently in the bathroom or asleep.

As for our new favorite Eraser, Taz had learned to use his transformation driving away rats. I think it was a good thing. Maybe sometimes Erasers can't help themselves. Maybe they just had to get it out of their system. But Taz was great on mouse patrol. He'd snap his jaws at them, occasionally accidently eat them. (I flipped out the first time he did that, thinking he was going to get the plague, but I couldn't stop him if he tried.) But he was probably healthier than any of us since he was getting the most to eat.

He'd also learned to walk and say, 'No.'

It was night time, which meant everyone in the house was up and at 'em. I was showing Kitten how to braid her hair when Salem walked into the kitchen.

"I'm going outside," she said. She'd been outside a lot. I figured she was antsy from being cooped up inside all day. I knew I was. I'd go out on a diaper run any day of the month just to get outside.

"Be back..."

"Before it's light out. I know," she finished putting her hood up and shut the door behind her. Kitten looked up at me.

"Cat, who's Jason?" she asked. I straightened at the sound of his name. I finished her braid in her flawlessly straight white hair.

"Jason is a very mean Eraser who used to be my friend," I said.

"You had friends there?" Kitten asked. I half smiled.

"He was the only one," I said. "That is until I met all five of you." Kitten smiled and scooted off my lap.

"Do I look pretty?" Kitten asked twirling like a ballerina to show off her braid.

"Definitely," I confirmed with a thumbs up. Eric walked into the kitchen and opened a cupboard. He paused by Kitten briefly to scratch behind her little kitty ears. She smiled at the affection and purred with delight.

"She's right. You're going o have to beat off the boys with a stick," he said. Kitten giggled and touched her hair.

"No, I don't need a stick. I have claws." The girl makes a point. "Can I get my pictures taken?"

"No. None of us are getting their pictures taken," I said quickly. Kitten pouted.

"But Salem got to do it!" Eric dropped a pot that he was holding on the ground. I felt my face go white.

"What do you mean Salem got her picture taken?" Eric asked making her spin around and face him. She looked a little scared.

"The other day. She said someone walked in front of her and took her picture, then left," Kitten said. I jumped from the beanbag chair and Eric slammed the cupboard door. "What's the big deal? Only one person will see it."

"Stay here Kitten," Eric ordered.

"Tarzan!" I yelled. He poked his head in the kitchen. I reached to the back of my jeans and tucked my tail inside a pant leg. "Salem's out there. She got her picture taken. Keep an eye on Kitten and Taz. Get all of our stuff together. We'll probably leave tonight." His eyes widened.

"Her picture?!" he shouted outraged. Without another word passing between us, Eric and I shot through the door. All I could do was pray and I didn't even know how. I could just think toward the heavens, _Oh God, please let her be alright._

"A few days ago? That's more than enough time to get it printed in the tabloids," Eric said as we jogged beside one another outside.

"I'll look for her at her usual spots," Eric said.

"I'm going to check the newspaper stands," I said. We turned our separate ways. I ran up to the nearest stand. It was locked down for the night. Suddenly I heard the ring of a bicycle. My head jerked around to see a young boy.

Yes! It was early enough to still catch the delivery boys. I waited patiently for the kid to throw the stack of papers my way. As I calculated my plan of action I was interrupted. Suddenly the kid was attacked by a black shadow. I knew that shadow, I realized. I started to run closer.

Salem held the horrified boy pinned to the ground with her yellow eyes piercing through him.

"I do not want my pictures in your dirty paper! Can't you see I'm hiding here!" she hissed in his face.

"I don't print the papers m-ma'am. I just deliver them," the poor guy stuttered. He gulped. "Please don't eat me." I saw Salem cringe. It was then I knew the pain she felt. She felt different. She was always furry and literally darker than night with glowing eyes. She knew she stood out more than the rest of us. I had sensed her pain many times when I reminded her to keep her hood up, when I was trying to convince her to wear gloves to hide her fur covered hands so she didn't have to walk around with them stuffed in her pockets all the time.

"You tell your boss that I'm already a freak enough without him to point it out to the rest of the world," Salem threatened with a crack of pain in her voice.

"Hey!" I snapped. Salem dropped the boy flat on his back and looked at me with guilty eyes. I got into view of the boy. I looked from one to the other as I came up with a half ass plan off the top of my head. I crouched down on all fours and extended my claws. Them my tail poked out from my waistband to reveal what I was. "What have I told you about playing with your food?" Salem was confused for a moment. I winked at her. With a slight nod, she bowed her head.

"You said not to," she said quietly.

"That's right. Now finish him off before he goes and tells his boss more about you," I said like a mother telling her child to eat the rest of her vegetables. The boy held up his hands.

"No! I won't tell! I swear I won't!" he cried.

"How do we know you won't. It's your paper? Isn't it?" I argued. He was crying now. I was even beginning to feel a little guilty.

"I won't! I swear! I'll burn every paper I have with her picture on it, you can make sure I do," he said hesitantly. Good, it will save me the trouble.

"You better," I said. He started to calm. "We'll watch you from afar. Burn it someplace secluded. I don't want her face anywhere where your slimy kind can see her!"

"Okay, okay!" he cried. I looked at Salem who was looking at me like a some girl who was in trouble with her mother. I turned my attention back on the boy.

"And give me one," I said. In a heartbeat it was in my hand. "Let's go." Salem and I turned the other direction. The first page that showed a picture of a preteen walking down the street with a sweatshirt, her furry face poking out ofher hood.

The title read, _First Bigfoot? Now Catgirl?_

"Cat girl?" I asked whoever wrote the article. "That's lame."

"There was another issue yesterday," she confessed in a quiet voice. Salem stared at the ground and I heard a sob escape from her. She put her hands over her face. I put an arm over her shoulder and she leaned into me.

"Aw, come here." She continued all the way home.

When we got to the house, Tarzan had three blanket's holding together some of our stuff.

"Did you find her?" Tarzan asked. I looked at him confused for a moment. It was then that I noticed she was hiding behind me. I moved out of the way to show her to him.

"Did you get your picture taken again?" Kitten asked innocently as she poked her head in the kitchen. Salem narrowed her eyes at her. Kitten's widened.

"Kitten, can you go into the other room with Taz?" I asked. She nodded and turned on the radio with Taz beside her. Tarzan and I had to play the parent roles.

"Are you okay?" Tarzan asked first. She nodded.

"Do you know what kind of danger you caused us? We're in so much trouble. We could've lived here for like another month!" I said crossing my arms across my chest.

"I'm really, really, _really, _sorry," Salem said. Eric came through the door.

"I couldn't find her!" he said. He saw her and he let out a breath of relief. "Oh man, Salem! You-" I put a hand on his shoulder.

"This is a delicate situation, I think Tarzan and I got this one," I whispered. Eric seemed a little disappointed. I guess he always saw himself as one of the parent roles. He was a bit of a loose cannon though when it came to Salem. They just didn't get along that well. He stomped past Tarzan into the room with Kitten and Taz.

"I-I..." Salem started. "I'm sorry. I'll leave..." I straightened up and grabbed her arm. Eric returned having heard this. He looked just as shocked as we did.

"Leave where?" I asked. She sniffed.

"I'm a danger to the pride," she said choking on her words. I looked at the doorway where Eric was watching. I passed him a glance. _See? This is what happens when you threaten to kick out people,_ I thought hoping that somehow he got the message. He took one look at my glance and tore his eyes back to her

"Like Taz," she said. "I'm worse than Taz! I'm going to get us sent back to Sch-" I scooped her up in a hug and held her. Tarzan put a hand on her back.

"Salem, it's okay. It was a mistake. It was just a very dangerous mistake. But next time we're in danger you tell us right away so we can get a head start," Tarzan said. Salem switched from me to give Tarzan a hug. I watched them admiringly.

"What if Taz makes a mistake?" Salem whispered. Tarzan and I looked from each other to Eric. He must have felt like crap just then.

"Nothing. We're staying together. Through good times and bad," I said. Salem wiped away her tears on her hand. "Go wash up. We gotta go." Salem left us to go to the bathroom.

"Aw, how touching," came a new voice from the window.

* * *

How about it? Ya like? 


	11. Crashing The Party

And another one! Wasn't the third Maximum Ride great? I loved it. I actually started writing this right after I read the first one which was like a million years ago. There's another fun fact. Take that home and chew it. It's delicious.

* * *

Speak of the devil and he shall appear. I guess even if you don't, he still appears because Jason was standing outside our door with about ten other Erasers, fully formed and out in the open. They must have gotten permission to go out in public fully formed. There was a crash in the other room.

"Erasers!" Kitten shouted.

My attention was immediately shifted to the commotion in the other room."Taz! Kitten!"

"Good grief, Cat. You've named them?" Jason came from behind me. Tarzan and I jumped from surprise. How'd they get so quiet?

"Leave us alone, Jason!" I shouted. I could hear Taz crying.

"Give him to me!" Kitten cried reaching out. An Eraser picked her up and held her as she fought and thrashed. That a girl. Suddenly Taz went ballistic, as Eric liked to call it. Fur sprouted from every pore in his body. Muscles bluged and his jaw jutted out. He was small but he had the element. His body squirmed out of the surprised Eraser's hold and leapt onto Kitten's Eraser.

It was all the distraction we needed.

Jason was beginning to change. Before he did, Tarzan hit him with the heel of his hand up his nose. The break would've shattered the bone of any human, and sent little pieces of bones firing directly at his brain. But he wasn't human. He staggered backward like it was just another punch in the face. I took this opportunity to run through the house and search for the others.

I heard the sound of Eric's voice shouting in one of the bedrooms.

"Let her go!" he shouted. I ran in and found him on top of a Eraser's body. The striped boy was holding on desperately. His only weapon was his unnaturally long fangs. He opened his mouth and got a mouthful of fur. Salem hit the ground hard released from her Eraser's grip.

"Salem, come on," I said coaxingly. She kicked the Eraser in it's groin and scrambled in between it's legs. She ran into my arms panting. "You know what to do. Get the car. Fast. Take anyone who's not fighting with you. Otherwise don't stop anything." She brushed passed me and I pounced onto Eric's Eraser with him. Suddenly it reached up with a massive fist and tore the teenager off his back and into the wall.

"You're mine!" I growled as I jumped to the spot where Eric had once been. I closed my jaws on the base of his neck and dug my claws into his cheeks. He whined and we both came crashing down with me under him. Suddenly another Eraser pushed the stunned one off of me. Jason, of course. He pinned me and we laid there growling and biting at each other's faces.

Suddenly Tarzan came barreling toward us. He knocked of Jason and I got up to fight him. Someone grabbed my hair and yank me back so hard I flew into the wall.

"Ah!" I screamed painfully. That Eraser picked up his boot and shoved my face sideways into the wall. I opened my eyes wide. I dug my claws into his skin and pulled toward me. I could feel the ripping muscle under my nail. The Eraser screeched in pain, then I heard something clack to the floor.

A tranquilizer gun. I smiled to myself. I grabbed it and faced it toward him.

"And that's why you don't play with your prey," I said feeling like an action heroine. A feathered dart hit the side of his neck. He almost immediately fell backwards. I jumped to my feet like Rambo and let out a triumphant Xena-like warcry.

One had Eric over his shoulder. I aimed and fired. After a dazed moment he ran head first into a wall. I shot Jason in the back. He fell limp in a struggle with Tarzan and collapsed under his hold. I leapt over the bodies over to Eric. Tarzan looked at him. Our little Eric looked so helpless. He was bleeding from the head unconscious. I touched his hair and muttered my apologies.

"He's not moving," Tarzan said quivering.

"He's breathing, I'm sure he'll be fine," I said. Tarzan threw Eric over his shoulder effortlessly and ran with me.

"Kitten! Taz!" Suddenly the little white haired girl came running down the hall. An Eraser turned awkward in our small hallway. I raised the dart gun. "Get down, Kitten." She looked at me and after taking a moment to register what was going on she dove headfirst into carpet. I shot twice in his chest.

The massive beast fell to it's knees. That's when I noticed on the Eraser's back was Taz, in wolf form, holding onto the creatures tricep with nothing but his fang. He stood up with his hands in the air and let out a puppy howl.

"Awooooo-woo-woo!" he shouted triumphantly

"Yeah, that's great Taz," I said tearing him from the lifeless body. I hoped these darts weren't poisonous. "But we gotta go." He jumped into my arms and changed back. There was a honk outside. Salem had the car. She drove up to the side on the house in a too small black corvette for the six of us. However, we already talked about speed being more important than comfort when we were on the run.

She waved at us, too distracted to notice the two Erasers that leapt out from their hiding places across the street. One slammed his fist through the glass window and grabbed Salem by her neck. She screamed as he gripped my little girl by the hair and dragged her out of the car. Fury ran through me. I pointed my tranquilizer at him.

"Get away from her, you..."

"One false move and we snap her neck!" yelled one. I held my gun.

"You kill her and you're going to be sleeping a lot longer than your friends inside," Tarzan said coolly. Kitten clung to my leg and buried her face in my sweater. The Erasers pulled her out of the car gently obviously cautious about upsetting the lion-girl with the gun.

"Alright, let's make a new deal. How about you put down the gun..."

"How about you put the girl down before I call animal control on your friends. The people would tranq them and dissect their bodies. They might even figure out the whitecoats little operation. They wouldn't like that, would they?"

"How about you put down the gun or we just kill her. You may get to turn us in, but what's going to happen to poor little Fluffy? Is her life worth it?"

"Cat!" Salem shouted with her hands shaking in front of her. Kitten pulled her face away from my sweater. One Eraser turned to the other.

"Get the ones that are inside. We're out of here," he said. I lowered my gun and eased it onto the floor. "Get them all." We were powerless as the Eraser walked up to the gun and shot each of us systematically. We were out cold in the enemies hands.

* * *

Uh oh. How will our heroes and heroines escape? I'll tell you when I find out because I don't really know. But I promise I will work on it! 


	12. School's Back in Session

Hey guys! I don't own anything Maximum Ride related except for these kitty dudes and dudettes right here.

Sorry. I'm running out of creative disclaimers.

* * *

"Geez, Cat." That voice sounded like_...Aw, crap._ "Do you always sleep this much?" I woke to find myself sprawled on my stomach. I had a headache the size of New Jersey and the insanely bright lights weren't helping. Neither was Jason.

"No," I mumbled seeing that familiar white room. I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping and praying this was a horrific dream. But it wasn't. "No, no, no." We were caught, I realized. I lifted my head to observe my surroundings. Surprisingly I wasn't in a cage or tied down to a stretcher. And there was Jason right there in my sights. Another thing, I was completely alone. This made panic rise into my chest. I heaved my breaths in worry. How long had it been since I'd been alone without my pride?

Too long. I didn't like the feeling at all.

"Where are they?" I said getting up on all fours. Jason cocked his head.

"You know one thing is pretty admirable about you. You never give up. You wanna know where you disappointed me?" he asked as though I cared. I rolled my eyes and sighed to make it blatantly clear that I didn't want to here his opinions. Jason went on, "You brought all of your little kitty friends. You could've made it."

This struck a cord. No, I couldn't have and I knew it. I was sure of it. The pride was the only thing that inspired me to leave. It was the only thing that kept me from going insane with fear at the thought of ever coming back to School. They were my lifeline. New passion rose up in me making me and not care what whitecoats heard me talk.

"Where's my pride?" I said clear and strongly. Jason laughed.

"You have pride? That's new."

"No, you idiot. Where's the rest of the pride? The other cats?" I said growing more frustrated. He thought for a moment. He shrugged.

"Oh. A pride, like a pack. Beats me," he said. He quickly changed the subject. "But I'm just glad you're awake. You see I've been promoted." He reached for my arm and pulled me to my feet. I shrugged him off and tried to claw his face. He easily dodged my attack.

"I'm not impressed," I growled.

"You should be. It's actually quite amazing. See you have your own pride, well I've developed my own pack. They do what I say," he said. It was then I heard a click in the walls. Like something unlocking. Then metal boards came out of the walls. My muscles tensed. I dropped down to all fours ready to pounce or run. Jason had a confident smile. We moved out of the way of the boards as they formed a maze.

"What's going on?" I asked him.

"It's just another test. Nothing to be worried about." Tests were just about everything to be worried about. Up at the top of the huge room were the faceless whitecoats staring through windows with their eyes with no souls.

"I want to see my family," I said. I did not like Jason's grin.

"You will," he said. Jason put his fingers to his lip and whistled. My muscles tensed completely. I don't know if you've ever seen Jurassic Park. I haven't either. But the stories Eric told me about it were scary. Dinosaurs? Back again? Well somehow these guys did it. The new Erasers were almost seventy-five velociraptor.

That's right. Michael Chrichton was going to be pissed.

There were openings in the walls where the new mutants emerged from. They were green and with scales on their bodies. They didn't look human at all when you looked at their eyes. Erasers sometimes have that smug look in their eyes that made them look somewhat human. Like they had thoughts of their own when they weren't killing or chasing other mutants. These dino-Erasers did not look like that. When you saw their eyes they looked like nothing aside from hungry. Instead of fingers and toes there were five large, black claws. Where the big toe should be there was a huge claw. Just like Eric said. Their wide mouths were locked in a grin with jagged teeth/ They stalked towards us.

"See, this time it's me calling the shots," Jason said. As if the situation weren't scary enough he had to deliver that little slice of information. I was starting to get worried as they stalked toward us, calculating as they watched. Looking at the others and seeing what positions they're teammates were at before they started the hunt. The creatures surrounded us and were getting closer. Jason snapped his fingers and at once they all paused.

"Okay," I said. "What's the point of this?"

"I wanted to try out these bad boys in a real hunt. No more of this chimp chasing stuff. The whitecoats wanted to see your dedication to your pride. So we compromised. Somewhere in this building is all of the members of all your pride. Even the little Eraser, which I am thoroughly confused about. Oh well. I'm sure we'll have time to talk about that later though. Anyway, the doors to their cages are unlocked. Are you ready?" My eyes widened as I looked around.

The raptors were only feet away!

"What! Right now?" I complained with a shaking voice.

"One..." I shook my head in disbelief.

"Jason!" He couldn't be serious. He wasn't going to sic a bunch of velociraptors on me. But he didn't show any signs of relenting.

"Two..." He was serious!

"Damn it!" I cried realizing I had to act now. I jumped over the heads of the dino-Erasers. They watched me eagerly restraining themselves from acting without command.

"Three!" He whistled again. I zipped through the maze blindly. The first turn I made was a dead end. _Figures._ I jumped at the wall and climbed to the top. If you can't go through, go over. The board was only about an inch thick, but this is where a tail comes in handy. Lifting my tail for balance, I ran on the wall and peered across the room where I saw the way out.

A door!

BAM! A raptor head butted the wall and I came tumbling down with uncatlike grace. But I recovered quickly. He pulled his head back to snap at me. I leapt up on the board again and made it to the top with record speed. _Put that down on your clipboard_, I thought at the whitecoats.

The door! I went through it and closed the door behind me. They tried to open the door so I held it closed. It shook as the dino-Erasers pounded at it. But I had the door closed.

"Um, excuse me," said a irritatingly cocky voice. I turned my head. Another Eraser. The wolf kind. My body tensed. They weren't even giving me a chance! They saw my worry. "Don't get your panties in a bunch. We're just refereeing. And that is against the rules." He nodded to me holding the door closed.

"I don't care," I snapped. The Eraser started to change. I took a moment to scratch at him, but I missed. I couldn't hold on anymore. "Go to hell!" I shouted since I was too busy running for my life to exchange more pleasantries. I started down one of the many halls in the School.

I had to find the others. We had to get out of here _pronto._

* * *

Don't ask me what inspired to me to make dino-Erasers. But it sounds like something evil scientists would do. Anyway... 

Thank you for the reviews, Night Alchemist! I will keep this story going!


	13. Canine Counterparts

I'm sorry, but this one's short. I'm officially out of prewritten work. So now I gotta spend time writing and not just uploading. I will do it as fast as possible though! I promise!

I do not own anything Maximum Ride related except my the pride. And Jason.

* * *

Eric found himself curled up in a dog cage underneath someone's desk. He sighed and then punched the ground in frustration. They got captured! After all that, they were right where they started! He looked around. But why was he under a desk? He didn't know and didn't care. He just knew he had to get out of there. Eric tensed up and charged at the cage walls. The cage slid a tiny bit towards under his momentum. It wasn't much. But he was getting somewhere. He pushed again and again. Then he hit a wall. 

"I'm not going to stay here," Eric said. He pounced again focusing on his inner animal. His muscles coiled and he jumped at his cage. "I'm not going to stay here!" He started to back up again when he heard something.

"Yeah!" said a high pitched squeal. He looked around.

"Hello?" he asked looked out his cage door.

"Daaah," Taz heard gurgle slowly. Eric rolled his eyes.

"You just couldn't be someone useful could you?" he mumbled spitefully. Eric shook his cage. "Hello! Hello! Is anyone else in here? Cat? Tarzan? Salem? Kitten?" His words echoed into the nothingness of the area. If there was anyone else in there with him they couldn't talk. "Anybody else?"

"No, nah-no, no, no, no," Taz said calmly from somewhere above him. Great, now the little beast was starting to talk.

"Where are you?" Eric asked. He looked up and saw Taz hanging from a hook in the ceiling. There was a tether holding him that looked like it was wrapped all around him like a straight jacket. He tried to move and he started to spin from the ceiling slowly. Apparently he did not like that much. His face twisted in confusion and he started to moan like he was ready to cry.

"Ow," Taz whined in a soft voice. Eric glanced up at him when an idea struck him.

"Hey Taz," he said. "You can get out of there. Come on, get mad. You little psycho Eraser lets go. We can get out. All you gotta do is..." Taz started to cry. Eric shifted eagerly in his cage, hands on the bars. Taz knew that look. He was getting ready to change.

Taz opened his mouth and wailed. Tears were flowing freely and dripping on the ground. Eric felt his heart wrench. Who would hang a kid from the ceiling to cry like that? He knew exactly who. It was time to go.

"Come on, Taz. Come on!" he shouted. "Change! Change into that wolf thing! Do it!" Taz's mouth opened even larger. Eric shook his cage door.

"Taz! We need to get out of here!" Suddenly a tail popped out from the back of him. His fur started to shoot out from his skin and teeth jutted from his mouth. He roared violently and bit down trying to reach the tether that tied him down. Suddenly he was twirling around faster and faster. Eric watched completely intrigued. He struck a striking resemblance to the cartoon Taz when he was spinning like that.

Somehow, he got himself rolled up like a yo-yo. He bit down in the tether and yanked with all his might. He pulled and pulled until was nothing but threads. They snapped. Then he hit the ground panting and rolling on the ground trying to get out of the cloth that still bound him. Eric watched amazed. He reached as far as he could through the bars and caught Taz. The baby relaxed and changed back into the form of a normal human.

"Good work, Taz," he whispered. Then he started to untie the little boy so he could move. He was obviously tired. He stared at Eric with large eyes. He smiled at Taz and gently patted his head. "You did good." Taz almost smiled, but it was obviously that he was exhausted.

"Alright, kiddo. Can you unlock this cage?" Eric asked. Taz had a blank look on his face. "Please unlock the cage." The little one year old cocked his head to the side in confusion.

"Never mind," Eric said disappointed. His fingers fumbled through the bars desperately trying to undo the lock. Suddenly he heard the sound of a door opening and closing. He paused and waited a beat as he listened closer.

"Cat? Tarzan?"

No response.

"Salem? Kitten?" The footsteps came closer. Then whoever it was came into view. It was a girl, about fourteen years old walking barefoot on the linolium floor. She had black hair and looked like she was Native American. Her building was strong, but still mostly slender. She was maybe an inch taller than Eric. Eric stole a glance at her legs and then forced his fourteen year old brain to focus.

Taz got up and growled. This warned Eric immediately.

"Wow," he said. "A female Eraser. That's different." The dark haired girl eased away from Taz. "Get 'er, Taz! Sic her!"

"Wait!" the girl cried. Taz pounced on her only an Eraser would pounce. The girl reached out and grabbed him by the hip and squeezed. She caught him in midair as Taz relaxed and went limp in her arms. Eric looked at her through the bars questioningly. Eric looked at her confused. "It's a pressure point that makes Eraser's calm down. Every Eraser has one."

"This is Cat's test. They're making her find you," the girl continued. She reached for Eric's cage and pulled him out from underneath the desk.

"That explains why I'm under here," Eric commented as he still wondered what the female Eraser was doing. She pulled him out in the open. Then she stopped and hesitantly stooped down to look at Eric. Her brown eyes peered at him observingly.

"And why are you telling me this?"

"Call it loyalty," she said letting Taz down on the ground. "My name is Layla. It's nice to meet you Eric. Now if you promise not to attack I will let you out of this cage."

"Why should I listen to you, dog-lady?" Eric said, then immediately wished he'd said something cooler.

"Because the whitecoats assigned a mate for each of you," Layla said. "And where I come from, mates don't let their mates get trapped in dog cages." Eric's blue eyes widened as she said this. Layla smirked and started to undo the lock on his cage.

"Call me a hopeless romantic," she added. Eric smiled shyly and looked away to hide his shock. The door opened. Layla offered her hand. Eric looked at it questioningly. Layla waited somewhat nervous. She was risking a lot by letting him out, or at least that's what she was leading him to believe. Eric took her hand, surprising himself by doing so. They caught each other's eyes.

Layla went a shade darker with her blush. Eric grinned dumbly. Then shook his head of the thought. He crawled out of the cage and hurriedly picked up Taz.

"Thanks," he said. "But I don't trust Erasers." Layla's shoulders slumped with disappointment. With rejection.

"Says the kitty holding a baby Eraser," Layla said recovering with a natural attitude. She put her hands on her hips and blew a strand of black hair out of her face coolly.

"Why did you save me?" Eric demanded to know. Layla picked herself up.

"Let's just say I was curious," she said stomping away furiously. "And you're welcome." She left the room leaving Eric standing there with Taz in his hands. Eric looked at the baby who was busy morphing back into his human appearance.

"I guess all girls are crazy. No matter what DNA they have in them," he muttered. "Wanna go find Cat?"

"Yeah!"

"Okay, lets go find her and the others," he said.

* * *

How about it? A girl Eraser? I've never heard of one before in any of the books come to think about. Then again I have a terrible memory. 


	14. Elmo Saves the Day!

I do not own anything Maximum Ride related. Only the pride, Jason, and I guess now I can add Layla to the list.

* * *

I ran down the halls on all fours. The pads of my feet were sore from all the running. I stopped down the next ultra white hallway and closed my eyes. I listened with sensitive ears for anyone in my pride. Or anyone who might be sneaking up on me. I heard a noise.

My eyes snapped open just in time to see a dark haired girl come to a screeching halt. She stopped and looked at me. _Eraser. _

"You caught me in a very bad mood, kid!" I shouted arching my back ready to pounce. She looked at me for a moment and just as quickly she was uninterested. She turned down the doorway she'd just come from. She held up her hands defensively just as two other Erasers jumped on her. I watched in confusion as they dragged her away by the scruff of her neck.

"Hm..." I thought out loud. "Better her than me, I suppose." I hurried, claws scraping the linolium as I continued blindly with open ears. I listened for Taz's coos or cries. Maybe Tarzan could roar for me, like when we first escaped.

Or maybe...

What was that? I focused hard on the sound. It was incredibly faint. I could barely hear it at all. I might have even dismissed it if hadn't sounded so familiar.

* * *

"Louder, Kitten!" Salem ordered. The younger girl stopped. "How's anyone supposed to hear us?"

"I'm trying!" Kitten whined.

They were together in a thick plexiglass prison that was sound proof to regular humans. To a feline hybrid? Who knows?

Salem cleared her throat. "Okay. One more time. One, two, three..." The feline girls took a deep breath.

"CAN YOU TELL ME HOW TO GET, HOW TO GET TO SESAME STREET!" they sang together at the top of their lungs. Salem started the next line when Kitten intervened.

"LA, LA, LA-LA. LA, LA, LA-LA. ELMO'S WORLD!" she sang in her little seven year old voice.

"I don't want to sing Elmo's World. I hate Elmo," Salem complained. Kitten had a sad look on her face.

"I like Elmo," she whimpered.

"Well, I don't. Elmo can go screw himself," Salem said as she folded her arms across her chest. Kitten's jaw dropped. She looked around the white room and then folded her arms mimmicking her fellow pride member.

"I can't believe you just said that," said Kitten appalled. She looked away with her nose up in the air.

* * *

It stopped! I turned around in the hallway I was standing in and looked around. Why had it stopped? Did someone capture them? Were they hurt? Speaking of hurt...

I spun around just as a pack of the dino-Erasers rounded the corner into the hallway. I arched my back ready to tear them apart. The leader walked forward and opened his jaw, hissing his warning. Seeing as how I have the ability to do the same, I hissed right back at him. But I was backpeddling. There were three others with him. All of them edging slowly towards me.

I growled baring teeth. Then I remembered something. What was it Eric said about the way they hunted in the movie? Oh that's right. They had a few velociraptors distract their prey while the others snuck around and attacked. My instincts told me to duck and if there's one thing I learned its to follow your first instinct.

I did, and just in time a velociraptor flew over my head right into his buddies that were sent to distract me. They fell over awkwardly, struggling to get up with their short clawed arms. I snorted at them and offered myself a proud smirk.

"Ow! My hair!" someone yowled.

That one sounded as clear as day. They were right around the corner!

I ran and checked the door to a room that looked like an office from the outside. I looked inside and there was nothing inside except a clear plastic box, with my pride inside. My brow furrowed. It was obviously sound proofed. My girl were inside, but Kitten had jumped on Salem and with a fist full of her black hair.

"Girls!" I shouted, but duh, they couldn't hear me. I walked up to the glass and knocked on it. They both stopped. Both of their faces automatically went from a look of fury to extreme happiness.

"Cat!" I could barely hear them as they chorused together. I pointed to Kitten and gesture for her to get off Salem. She immediately obeyed. There was a code on the door to their cage on the outside. The code was printed on the lock outside. The whitecoats apparently didn't care about holding them in as much as they wanted me to find them. I released them.

Kitten made a bee line straight to my waist.

"Catty!" she cried happily. She looked at me. "Salem said that Elmo can go screw himself."

"Salem," I said. Salem looked away.

"No I didn't," she said.

"You did too!" Kitten squealed.

"Okay, we can talk about this later," I interrupted. We each heard someone walking toward the door with our sensitive ears. We were trapped. I held onto both Kitten and Salem by the shoulders and gave them a nod they understood immediately. I was going to be the one to take this one down. They were going to run. The door opened. It was a good thing I hesitated before I jumped.

"Eric?"

Eric walked in with little Taz in his arms.

"Taz!" I cried gratefully. He handed him to me.

"Gah!" Taz greeted back at me. I gave him a kiss on the cheek.

"How'd you get out?" I asked Eric. Eric sighed.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," he mumbled. I decided to ask him later.

"Okay. Five down. One to go," I said taking Kitten's hand, holding Taz with the other, and leading the search.

* * *

Kind of a filler, but don't worry! I'm going somewhere with this! I swear!


	15. Did Somebody Say Candy?

I do not own anything Maximum Ride or Starbucks related. Except for my carmel frappacino. I have the receipt to prove it. I also own the pride, Jason, Layla, and Dr. Kandi. (The list just seems to keep getting longer.)

* * *

Okay, I had the kids. That was good. All the younger ones were safe. And to my surprise not one of the whitecoats had laid a hand on them. They were perfectly fine! At least so far. We were still one short. So it was onwards to find Tarzan. 

I felt a little better with some company. The dino-Erasers stayed away once they saw that we were together. I guess they knew better than to attack a lethal pack of wild cat-kids. Or maybe Jason had ordered them to lay off. Who knew at this point?

"I bet he escaped," Kitten said optimistically.

"Yeah," Salem agreed. "I bet he used his super strength to rip the bars right out of his cage."

"Shut up. I'm not talking to you," Kitten snapped.

"Hey!" I said stopping them both. "Salem, take back what you said about Elmo."

She rolled her yellow eyes and sighed with reluctance. "I'm sorry for what I said about Elmo." I looked to Kitten.

"You. Forgive her," I ordered. Kitten had the same look of reluctance.

"It's okay," she grumbled.

"Good," I said quite happy with myself and my good parenting. We took the stairs down a floor. We stopped at the end and looked down each end of the hallway. Eric stood by my side.

"All clear," he said. I looked at him confused. "It's military talk. It means there's no bad guys around. Come on, Cat. Even you should know that one." I narrowed my eyes at him.

"Don't push it, buddy. Now which way do we go?"

"Third door to the left," Kitten said popping up out of nowhere in between us. We looked at her.

"How do you know?" Eric asked.

"Because there's a sign on the door," Kitten said. We both looked up. At first I thought she was kidding. Who would put a sign on a door telling you exactly where you conveniently missing friend was? And yet, there it was. A big sign on the door that said, 'Tarzan in here'.

I smiled smugly.

"Come on, Eric. Even you should have figured out that one," I said to him. He tossed me a snooty look which only made me more smug of course.

"It's obviously a trap," Eric pointed out.

"You have a better idea?" Salem asked.

"No," Taz said from my arms as he had suddenly decided to be a part of the conversation. We looked at him and then at Eric. He took a deep breath and shook his head.

"We're going to regret this," he said gloomily.

"Darn right we are. Let's go!" Salem said leading the way.

* * *

Author's Note: It's so obvious its a trap. Maybe a little too obvious. Maybe so obvious that its not a trap! Or maybe they anticipated that they might think its a little too obvious and decide its not a trap. Then they made it a trap! Well, you'll never know for sure until you stick around for the next chapter. 

Then again this is pretty short. I'll just keep going then. Consider this little side note as Intermission. Go ahead and take a bathroom break, get a sandwich, or continue IMing your friends. I'll wait.

Done?

Okay! On with the show.

(Sorry for silliness. I've had a LOT of caffine today. Yay for Starbucks!)

* * *

So we opened the door and found... 

Oh come on. Like you don't know? Of course its a trap! But at least they didn't lie. Tarzan was inside. He stood in the middle of the giant room, chains on his wrist and ankles. He had a tired look on his face. He also had plenty of bruises forming over his body. Sweat dripped off his bare chest and blood dripped from his hairline. He looked at us and shook his head.

"I can't believe you actually came in here," Tarzan said. I took in his appearance somewhat ashamed of myself. Maybe if I'd gotten there sooner I could have stopped him from getting beaten up by Erasers. I was lucky the others were okay. Maybe even a little but cocky. Now I saw Tarzan and fell my heart sink to the pit of my stomach.

"At least we got here," I said lamely.

"Excellent!" said a woman's voice. We all perked up. There was a catwalk around the perimeter of the room. She was a blonde haired, blue eyed, hip swaggering whitecoat with a tail of Erasers following her. I could smell her lip gloss all the way down on the floor. Her heels clicked with her as she walked.

"Aside from a few minor technical difficulties," said the woman turning her direction toward Eric specifically. Eric avoided her gaze. "You did pretty well, Cat."

"Thanks, I try," I said. "What did you do to Tarzan?"

The woman cocked her head back and laughed.

"Tarzan," she said. She shook her blonde hair as she giggled. "I can't believe you named him Tarzan."

"What's wrong with my name?" Tarzan asked.

"Yeah. What would your name be?" I asked her.

"I'm Dr. Kandi?" she announced and gave a little wave. That's when I realized something was very wrong with this woman. She looked incredibly young. I doubted she'd never bought her own six pack of beer with her own ID.

"Dr. Kandi?" I scoffed. I looked to Eric.

"Funny, that's more of a stripper's name than a whitecoat's," Eric added. We all exploded in snickers. Eric gave a snide grin. Dr. Kandi looked annoyed from a moment. Then she laughed with us. Suddenly our laughter ended. She held up her hand and snapped her fingers. Without warning an Eraser entered the room and charged Tarzan from behind. He was helpless in his chains. He gave out a roar of pain as the Eraser held onto Tarzan with its claws. Tarzan wriggled his body. Before either of us could reach him to help Dr. Kandi snapped her fingers again.

The Eraser got off of Tarzan and sauntered over to the other side of the room. She remorphed into her human form as the dark haired girl I saw eariler getting mauled by her own. We watched her with death glares as we went to aid Tarzan.

"Good girl, Layla," Dr. Kandi said.

"Thank you, ma'am," the girl responded like the soldier she was. She shot a glance at Eric and then stood at attention.

"Let me finish my introduction," Dr. Kandi said. "My name is Dr. Kandi. I am the director of the breeding program. I train the Erasers. They all belong to me. Right ladies and gentlemen?" Erasers came out of every corner of the room from seemingly nowhere.

"Ma'am, yes ma'am!" they said at once.

* * *

Bet you didn't see that coming.

Love ya guys! Keep the reviews coming. I love reading them!


	16. There is Another

I don't own anything Maximum Ride related except for:

1. The pride

2. Jason

3. Layla

4. Dr. Kandi

Warning: The list might grow

* * *

_Well, this sucks._

That was the thought that kept popping up in my head. I know I'm right, but why couldn't I think about something more useful. Like, _Hey! I know how to escape!_

Because that's just the way life is, I guess. Life has terrible timing. Later on when I try to go to sleep I'll probably have the thought, _Dammit! I should have done that!_

My brain was too slow to make the rest of my body do something heroic. So they took us away all together. Tarzan was still bloodied and shackled. I had Taz in my arms so I couldn't help him. Plus I was busy preoccupying the girls so they didn't have to see their big brother like that. If I could do nothing else I would keep their spirits up. We were led to our prison which ended up being...

Guess. Just guess.

Give up?

If you guessed a white room with a lock on the door, you win! You can pick up your prize in the lobby.

"Not very creative," I commented as the Erasers left locking the door behind them.

Eric agreed. "It's like deja vu in every single room." Eric took off his shirt and offered it to Tarzan to clean himself up. When he did I noticed the stripes on his back. His white and black skin looked tattooed. But he had no tail or ears. Aside from his coloring he looked perfectly normal.

"Why did they put chains on Tarzan?" Kitten asked concerned. Salem looked at him and then looked away. I leaned down and sat beside her on the floor. Kitten took off her beanie releasing her ears. They twitched a few time with the new sense of freedom in the open air.

"They put him in chains because..." To be honest he'd be easier to beat up. They could do whatever they wanted to him. "Because they're afraid of him."

"The whitecoats are afraid of Tarzan?" Kitten said. I could see her spirits lifting in her green cat-eyes.

"Because he's super strong. Because they know if he was free to move around he would break the Erasers in half!" I said.

"Really!" Kitten said. We looked at Tarzan. Our black, blue, red, purple, green, yellow bruised Tarzan looked at me with swollen eyes. I think then he realized that I was a liar. But these kids needed to be lied to. Even Salem and Eric seemed to be buying my less depressing explanation for the reason he was tied up.

"Yeah," Tarzan said through his split lips. "I can take twenty of them."

I grimaced. Okay, I never lied that bad.

"Cool!" Kitten said. "When I'm your age can I take twenty Erasers?"

"Of course, sweetie," I said. She looked at me with new excitement. This felt so corny, so "Leave It To Beaver." I might as well had added. _As long as you eat all your vegetables and drink a glass of milk everyday._

"I can take twenty Erasers now," Salem said smugly.

"Oh yeah?" I laughed. She nodded proudly and lowered her hooded sweater.

"Yeah? Well, I can take thirty," Eric said. Salem snorted.

"No, you can't!" Kitten giggled.

"I don't know," I said. "Eric's pretty hardcore."

"No!" Taz shouted happily. I rocked him. He curled up against me and started to fall asleep. We laughed and talked about how awesome we were. Scraps that we'd gotten into. We even talked about how well Taz had done in our fights. It was exactly what they needed. Pretty soon the excitment started to die down. Salem sat against Eric's shoulder who leaned his head on her's. Kitten curled up against Salem very cat-like. Her knees up to her chest and ears twitched in her sleep.

I stayed up with Tarzan. He was in too much pain to sleep. With Taz napping in my lap I sat next to him.

"How you doing?" I asked him now that we could speak honestly.

"I've never been in so much pain in my life," he finally said. "I can't move, I can't even sit perfectly still without the excruciating pain." I wanted to put a hand on his shoulder or lean against him to comfort him, but I didn't want to hurt him.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I should have gotten there sooner."

"They were talking about some weird stuff, Cat," Tarzan said. He turned to look at me, wincing as he turned his neck. "Jason..." He sighed. "I don't like the stuff he was saying about you. Calling you a bitch and...I don't even know what that means. I wanted to kill him for all the things he was saying about us. I tried to, that's why they went so hard. They kept on talking about the six cats." At that moment I felt a sense of pride (if you'll pardon the pun). My Tarzan, who'd come such a long way from the giant who wouldn't let me shave his massive mane, was beating the crap out of Erasers who had merely insulted us. I have to say he put his bad temper to good use.

"Yeah," I said returning my thoughts to the conversation. "They were talking about us."

"No they weren't," Tarzan said. I blinked in surprise. "I mean, they were talking about me, you, Kitten, Salem, and Eric."

"Yeah," I said. "The pride."

"Taz is part of the pride, but he's not a cat. We're five cats. Where's the sixth cat?" he asked. I realized he was right. The sixth cat.

Our private conversation wasn't so private anymore as Jason decided to enter the room. I waited for a whitecoat to follow him. Possibly that psycho Dr. Kandi too. But he was alone. His look wasn't mocking or smug. He had those serious eyes I saw when I was little. When I peered through the bars of my cage and saw my best friend.

For that reason alone I decided not to greet him with my usual not-so-pleasant pleasantries. He looked at our sleeping little feline kids and then at us.

"Can we help you?" Tarzan asked with venom in his tone. Apparently he wasn't feeling so forgiving.

"I want to talk to Cat. Alone," he said. I looked at Tarzan.

"No," Tarzan decided.

"That's not up to you, Humungo. That's up to her," he said nodding to me. Tarzan shrugged.

"Okay. I'll just round up the kids and we'll wait outside our prison," he said with dripping sarcasm at a civil tones as to not rouse those same kids from their well deserved sleep.

"You wanna come or what, Cat?" Jason asked me specifically. I nodded realizing that this was my time to get information. I walked up to Jason expecting to be put in shackles. I held out my wrists ready for the bands to snap on them tightly. Jason shook his head. Afraid he might change his mind, I gave Tarzan a confident smile and raised my eyebrows at him. He nodded in approval, though I could see the concern in his eyes. It made me feel kind of special to feel like he was worried about me.

It was just another day in the pride loving you fellow felines and worrying about them when they weren't in your sight. Jason and I started our stroll.

* * *

More drama! Good times...

Thank you all my lovely readers! You're beautiful! I love you all!


	17. That Wasn't Very Nice

I do not own anything Maximum Ride related. Only:

1. The pride

2. Jason

3. Layla

4. Dr. Kandi

But one day I will own the world! Mwa ha ha ha ha!!!! There is no escape pitiful humans!

I'm running out of clever disclaimers again.

* * *

We walked down the blinding bright halls. I was completely unbound. Jason was either breaking the rules or the whitecoats were just getting more and more stupid. 

"We know you'd never leave without your pride," Jason said as if he'd heard my thoughts. My heart sank. I hate it when Jason's right.

"I hate you, Cat," Jason said. My response was surprisingly automatic.

"The feeling's mutual, you ass."

"Do you know why I hate you?" he asked.

"The fact that I'm smarter than you? That I'm better looking than you? The fact that you're a dog and I'm a cat?"

"We didn't always hate each other. Even when I was a dog and you were a cat," he pointed out. He was right. He smiled at the memories. "Remember when we played shadow puppets in our cages?" He turned his hand into a talking puppet. I remembered with a smile of my own.

"And we made them fight?" I said making my own shadow puppet. He was serious again.

"Remember the first time your claws came out of your fingertips? You were flipping out and crying?" he asked. I nodded. "Remember the first time I turned into an Eraser for the first time. I lost control and tried to attack you. All you had to do was tap me on the nose and I had control again. We called it my..."

"Off button," we said together.

"Then you left me," Jason said. Once again he killed our happy moment. "Your parents came and rescued you like you were something special."

"Maybe I am special," I said immodestly. For those of you who are surprised I will remind you all that I have a cat's ego.

"You are. Or were. You can't walk through things anymore," Jason said with his stupid trademark snide grin. I was only half surprised that he knew about my former ability. Of course the whitecoats showed the Erasers how I'd escaped. I couldn't have done it without walking through things.

"And you never could," I taunted.

"At least I have a power," he said.

"At least I have friends, you loser," I spat. His punch was so sudden I staggered backward and fell on my butt. I looked up at him and debated on pouncing. He held up his fingers to his lips.

"You touch me and all I have to do is whistle. You're forgetting I have an entire army at my command," he threatened. I swallowed the urge to kill him and stuffed it somewhere safe where I could use it when I had a better opportunity.

"I had no idea your ego was so fragile," I said and received another slap in the face. Again I had to hold myself back. "So was this what you had to say? You just had to let me know that you hate me, as if I already didn't know?" Jason opened his mouth again like he wanted to tell me something. Then he closed it again.

Don't you hate when people do that? When people tell you they have something to say and _they just don't say it!!!_

"Whatever," I said rolling my eyes in irritation. I turned.

"Wait!" Jason said. I turned to face him when he just stabbed me right in the heart!

You read right. That is no typo. I said stabbed.

I gasped. He had stabbed a giant syringe right into my sternum. He pushed down hard. I cried out in horrible pain. Jason injected whatever it was into me. I couldn't react. Can you blame me? I just got stabbed! Let me tell you when you get stabbed there is nothing you can do but stare like an idiot. I looked at Jason who wasn't looking me in the eye, he was just watching the syringe with a strange calm over his face. My lip quivered. My body started to shake.

With one swift jerk, Jason pulled it out of me. I gasped again and moaned still in a state of shock. With this, he put the syringe back in his pocket where he was hiding it and led me by the elbow. I was recovering slowly. Very slowly. But just before we reached our prison I finally regained control of my brain.

I shrugged away from him.

"WHAT THE HELL!" I shouted. Jason looked at me bored.

"That was for the good times," he said. My brow furrowed.

"I'll repeat myself because obviously didn't hear me correctly, WHAT THE HELL!" I cried balling my fist furiously. I looked at my chest and smoothed over the tiny dot that was my wound. "What was that for!"

Jason refused to answer me. He just opened the door to our prison and pushed me roughly inside. I stumbled inside and turned as the door locked behind me. "Jackass!" I shouted after him. I put my hands on my hips satisfied that I had at least called him a name. At least it was something even if he deserved so much more.

I turned to see the entire pride looking at me with irritation. Taz was fussing in Tarzan's lap.

"Morning everyone," I said as light heartedly as I could.

* * *

Confused yet? If you aren't then I must not be writing as well as I'd hoped. Don't worry. It will make sense in due time. 


	18. What a Cowinkidink

I do not own Maximum Ride! In case you didn't get it the first thousand times I wrote that.

But I do own my characters! So there! At least I own something.

* * *

It's a stange thing when you're stuck in a room with no windows, no color, and the same people. It gets a little irritating to be perfectly honest. The six of us were either standing or sitting in various places, occasionally shifting across the room or going over to talk to someone. Eric stood up and walked across the room.

"Would you stop pacing!" Salem exploded at Eric. I slapped my forehead and went to the nearest wall to bang my head against it repeatedly. _Here we go again._

"I'm not pacing!"

"This is the second time you moved in one minute and forty-seven seconds! You can't sit still for even two minutes!" I looked around for a clock. Salem looked at me. "I counted."

"You need a life," Eric snapped. "Stop obsessing with how many seconds go by in between my walking across a freaking room."

Taz started to cry. Tarzan bounced him on his knee and made a face to distract him.

"Way to go. You woke up the puppy," Eric said to Salem. I rolled my eyes.

"Both of you knock it off!" Tarzan and I chorused. We looked at one another. It seemed these episodes were getting redundant.

"Anybody want to play rock, paper, scissors?" Kitten asked shattering the tension.

"For the seventeenth time in a row, no!" Salem said bringing the tension back from the dead. Kitten shrank back and leaned against me. I put my arm around her and patted her shoulder.

"Salem, relax," I said. She groaned loudly and hit her head against the wall. I decided to change the subject. "How long do you think we've been here?"

"Two days, sixteen hours, thirteen minutes and twenty seconds," she said as she stared blankly at the ceiling. A moment past. "21 seconds, 22 seconds, 23 seconds..." She went on.

"Geez, Salem! Stop counting!" Eric cried. Tarzan and I exchanged looks.

"There's nothing else to do!" Salem argued.

"Wait, how do you know we been in here two days, sixteen hours and..." I paused to think.

"Thirteen minutes and 46 seconds," Salem finished for me.

"Yeah."

"Duh. They have wireless internet," she said. We stared at her in disbelief. Salem looked at us obviously feeling uncomfortable under our gazes. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"

Salem had a brand new power.

Finally! I wondering where my good luck had gone. And now it was back! Very convenient. Okay, so Salem can talk to computers. As long as she's within range of a wireless computer she can do whatever she wanted with it. So before we started to make one of our famous escapes/escape attempts (depending on our luck), we decided to figure out more about the School.

We all stood around Salem as casually as we could blocking the cameras view.

"What do you want me to find out?"

"How to get out of here would be a good start," Eric said.

"Before that we should see exactly what we're doing. So all you have to do is just...go through their computer?" I asked her. She nodded.

"Yeah. I can see people IMing each other, emails people have saved or are writing write now, files, documents, video games..." Salem went on.

"The whitecoats have video games?" Eric asked.

"Some do. Some just play solitaire half the day," Salem said with a shrug.

Well. There you have it. The whitecoats are no different than anybody else. You know. If you forget about them being completely evil and deforming little kids.

"They keep going to this one website called to read a blog or something..." Salem started.

"Forget about that. What are they planning to do with us?" I interrupted not caring about what blogging any whitecoats were doing. Who cared about what they did with their time when they were screwing around? Salem waited a moment. Her eyes darted back and forth as she stretched mentally into their computers. We waited eagerly exchanging worried looks.

"It's all in Dr. Kandi's computer," Salem announced. We all groaned.

"Why can't you reach it?" I asked.

"Because its not wireless. I'd have to be touching it to get all the information from it," Salem said once again like it was an obvious fact.

"So, if we got you to Dr. Kandi's computer?"

"I can find out everything," she said.

"What about the security?" Eric asked.

"It might take awhile to figure out the codes. But I know I can do it," Salem said with a shrug. "It's part of the wireless system."

"Do it!" Kitten cried.

"Yeah!" Taz agreed suddenly waking up from his nap and startling us all.

"No!" Tarzan said right when I was taking a breath to say the same thing. I let him take the lead. "We need to find out what is going on. There may be more to what they want to do with us that they're not telling us. For all we know, this whole pride thing can just be a test. They might be watching us from afar. Attacking us every so often just to see how strong we're getting."

I blinked. I hadn't even thought of that. I felt like an idiot. I remembered what Eric had said when we first escaped.

"They let us go."

This whole thing could be a big setup!

"Cat, what's wrong with your hand?" Kitten asked. I looked at my hand. It was transparent. I touched my arm that was completely solid. It went right through.

"Whoa," Salem said.

My powers had gone away when that whitecoat had shot me with a tranquilizer gun with darts that weren't filled with tranquilizer. Jason had stabbed and injected me with a syringe. Now my powers were suddenly back. Convenient?

I thought about my extraordinary luck. The conveniently placed SUV when we first escaped. The man and the woman who just happened to abandon their house right in front of us giving us our first home? The money we found just lying around in their house or in the glove boxes of some of the cars we had stolen? Was it luck or were we doing exactly what the whitecoats wanted?

"Tarzan's right," I said. I threw my head back in frustration and groaned. Why hadn't I thought about this before! Because I was fantasizing about my perfect life with the pride, raising Taz, teaching the kids about life, and learning about life myself. "I'm so stupid!" I bursted and started to pace.

I didn't want to, but I forced myself to stop as I could tell the pride was watching me with worried looks. No time to sulk now. But I was definitely scheduling some sulking for later.

"Okay, the point is that Tarzan's right," I said looking at my hand as it became solid again. "But the good news is now we're on high alert. We can stay suspicious. Before we make our grand getaway we'll go find Dr. Kandi's computer and get all her crap..." I paused and snapped back into mother mode. "I mean stuff. None of you are allowed to say crap. Sound good?"

They all nodded.

"Okay. Salem tell us when its two in the morning. We'll go then," I told her.

* * *

Hmmm...Intriguing. Is it not?

You readers are AWESOME! You make me smile :-)


	19. Dude Where's My Foot?

I do not own Maximum Ride! In case you didn't get it the first thousand times I wrote that.

But I do own my characters! So there!

* * *

"OMG!" Salem gasped.

Eric sighed.

"Can you stop talking in abbreviations, please?" he asked harshly.

"What?" Kitten asked Salem.

"Deadsexyman just came back online! And Cutigirl16 just IMed him," Salem said. She closed her eyes to get a better mental picture of the screen. This was about the twentieth time we'd eavesdropped on some random whitecoat's conversation. I would say it was unethical, but the whitecoats have a lot worse coming to them than deserving to be eavesdropped on.

"What are they saying?" Kitten asked eagerly.

"He says he loves her," Salem said. "And then he put a smiley face on it." It was just weird for Salem to be staring at nothing in our prison and reading someone's entire conversation. Granted, it was entertaining.

"Aw," Kitten said. "That's so nice."

"Yeah, maybe they can get married, live happily ever after, and have little evil whitecoat babies," Eric said spitefully. I shot him a look that told him to keep his cool. Besides I wanted to know what happened to Cutigirl16. I'll admit it. Her conversations were by far the most interesting. Like an internet version of a soap opera. I nodded approvingly to Salem.

"Go ahead. Keep going," I told her.

"Now he says he wants to bend her over the side of his desk and-..." That was enough of that conversation.

"OKAY!" I interrupted by clapping my hands. "Salem, what time is it?"

"It's 2:03," she said.

"Why didn't you tell us when it was 2:00?" Eric asked standing up with Taz in his arms.

"Because Deadsexyman came online," she said. I rolled my eyes.

"It doesn't matter. It's time to go now," Tarzan said standing up. He stood by me as co-leader. He'd healed over for the most part, though he was still various different colors. At least he could move without hissing in pain. We stood up and moved toward the door. They looked at me, since this was my own expertise.

Tarzan walked Salem over to the security camera.

"Are you sure about this?" he asked.

"Sure, its just like stealing a car. I just have to send make the electricity it runs on go haywire. It'll suck up more energy than it takes to run on and it will overload," she said with a shrug. Oh, if only I had any idea what she was talking about. Tarzan reached down and picked up Salem, then he lifted her up. She touched the camera. It was quiet for a moment. Then it exploded. Little black plastic pieces went flying across the room. She giggled.

"That was fun."

I started towards the door.

"What's the code?" I asked ready for my part in all this.

"The code is G4792," Salem told me. I gave them a wink.

"I'll be right back," I told them all. Then I became transparent and went through the door. As I poked my head out I saw just one Eraser standing outside our door. He didn't look too competent. He was kind of just standing there looking the other way.

I took a quiet step outside the door. My right leg took a step and I tried to bring in my left leg. There was only one problem. I couldn't get my left foot through the door. I looked and concentrated. The rest of me was transparent. Everything that is, but my left foot.

Figures. I bet Jason did this on purpose. He gave me all my powers back except a little piece.

I pulled and pulled, however I was wasting time. The Eraser was going to notice me sooner or later. So I had to hop on one foot over to the little electronic pad with numbers and letters. I punched them in. They beeped noisily so I had to hurry.

"Hey!" the Eraser shouted. I finished punching in the code.

The latch undid itself. I opened the door where Tarzan greeted the Eraser immediately. Meanwhile, I let everyone else out including my solid foot.

"Come on!" I waved them to follow. The kids came out as Tarzan and the Eraser went at it in the hallway. I saw Tarzan's opening and he took it. He grabbed the Eraser by the back of the neck. I held the door open for him so Tarzan could throw him inside our former prison. Then I slammed the door shut.

"Good work," I praised Tarzan.

"Thank you," he said. "You weren't so bad yourself. Except your foot was stuck over on our side."

"I know," I said grumpily.

"Cat?" Salem said.

"What is it, Sale?" I responded.

"Can I start a blog, too?" she asked with big innocent yellow eyes.

"First you'll have to explain to me what a blog is, then we'll talk about it," I said leading the way down the hallway.

"First thing's first. Where's Dr. Kandi's computer?"

"Second floor. Room 321," she announced.

And so that was our next stop.

* * *

I really am tempted to start a blog. Do you think that's legal? Maybe if I write 'I don't own Maximum Ride' all over it. I don't know. 


	20. They Went Thatta way!

I do not own Maximum Ride! This is a problem. Because I want to own Maximum Ride. However, James Patterson has not returned any of my calls so at the moment, I do not own Maximum Ride.

But I do own my characters. So take that James Patterson!

Alright, alright. Enough with the disclaimer. I'll get on with it.

* * *

We got to Dr. Kandi's computer no problem at all. You should have seen us. As soon we came strolling down the halls the Erasers stepped out of our way and held open the door for us saying, "Thank you. We hope you had a pleasant stay at the School." 

Yeah, right.

PUNCH!

"Ah!" I hissed pulling back my hand and shaking it in pain. The Eraser that was in front of me staggered backward. Tarzan took over from there jumping at him and snapping his jaws at his neck. As they went at it on the floor I took a step back to observe the pride.

Kitten and Taz decided to make a team. The two younger kids were clambering all over him. Eric got down on all fours and crouched down behind him. Salem gave the final push. Kitten grabbed our little Eraser, Taz and jumped away as he went toppling over.

I wondered where Eric had learn that. I certainly didn't teach him that move.

The Eraser hit the hard floor with a loud crack that made everyone wince.

"Ew," Kitten voiced everyone's thoughts.

"Okay. Moving on," I said switching the focus. There was suddenly a loud crunch from the direction of Tarzan's personal fight. I turned to look and was surprised to see a struggling Eraser with his head actually _through _a wall, the remainder of its body trying to pull its head out. I looked at Tarzan who looked satisfied with himself. He brushed off his hands.

"Okay. Nice going gang," I said completely impressed. It was strange to think these were the kids who would start to cry if you ever turned off Sesame Street.

"Over here!" Salem said running past me. We followed her over to the end of the hallway and opened the door. Salem slammed it shut. "Wait no. That was the cafeteria."

"Did anyone see you?" Eric asked eyes widening. Salem grinned innocently.

"Maybe?"

The alarms blared and lights turned red. I slapped my forehead.

"Don't worry! I can turn them off," Salem said.

"It doesn't matter. They already know we've escaped," Tarzan said. She went to the door across the hallway. The cafeteria doors started to open. Tarzan threw himself at it to barricade it shut. Eric ran over to his side to help him, which was more thoughtful than it was helpful with Tarzan's strength.

Salem went to the next door and punched in the code. I took Kitten's hand as her other hand held Taz.

"Uh oh," Taz said.

"Hey! That's new! Cat, Taz just said 'Uh oh,'" she alerted me.

"That's great hun," I said distracted. We opened the door and stepped inside. The strange thing was that when we stepped inside we hadn't really thought of what we would do if Dr. Kandi was actually, physically on her computer. She swivled around just as surprised to see us as we were to see her.

Jason was next to her, and the young female Eraser we'd seen before was on her other side.

They both stood up.

"Well," Dr. Kandi was the first to speak. "This is awkward."

"Yeah," I agreed.

"We want to know what you're doing with us!" Salem demanded with admirable courage in her tone.

"Yeah!" Kitten and I agreed.

"And you!" I said pointing to Jason. "That whole foot thing not being able to go through stuff? Not funny."

"I thought it was," Jason argued.

"Enough!" Dr. Kandi said. Both Erasers straightened immediately. "This was not wise of you, Cat. You should be more concerned with escaping and less about what our intentions may or may not be." Maybe she was right. But I wasn't going to let her know that.

"Yeah. I bet that is exactly what you wanted," I snapped.

"Cat shouldn't we go?" Kitten said softly from my side at a voice that only one with sensitive ears of a cat could here. I touched her shoulder in response.

"Well, this has been fun and everything, but we really should go," I said.

"You honestly don't think it will be that easy do you? Layla, Jason, sic 'em," Dr. Kandi said. The Erasers pounced.

"Go!" I shouted to Salem and Kitten pushing them away. They obeyed without question. I stood in the line of fire as the two Erasers pounced at me. I let them hit me giving the girls enough time to get outside. Jason held onto my arm. Once I knew my girls were safe I knew it was safe to let myself phase through. The one called Layla tried to punch me.

She went right through me.

I became solid just enough to kick her up her chin. Jason grabbed me by my long lion tail. I went through him and turned to kick him. I only had a moment to notice that Layla was gone.

* * *

"Cat's in trouble!" Kitten told Tarzan. The older cat looked down at him.

"What happened?"

"Dr. Kandi's in there. So is Jason and another Eraser!" Salem said.

"What do we do?" Kitten asked Tarzan as he struggled to hold the cafeteria door closed as whitecoats and Erasers alike were trying were pulling on it.

"I'm going to help her," Eric said. He moved from the door knowing he wasn't doing much good by helping barricade it anyway. Suddenly the Room 321's door opened. Eric hesitated and cursed himself for doing so. Cat had taught him to never hesitate. But he couldn't help it.

Layla was standing right in front of him.

"Eric," she said in greeting.

"Get her!" Salem said. But all Eric could do was stand there.

"What do you want?" he asked Layla instead.

"I'm going to help you escape," she said.

"Cool," Kitten said.

"Why should we trust you?" Tarzan asked. Sweat was beginning to pour down his face. He couldn't keep every Eraser and whitecoat locked inside there for long.

"Because I'm offering help. You have a better idea of how to get out of here?" Layla snapped at him.

"She's helped me and Taz escape before," Eric mentioned. Tarzan still didn't seem so sure.

"What about Cat?" Salem asked.

"She's not my concern," Layla said. She looked at Eric. Eric swallowed as she focused on him. She blinked her brown eyes at him.

"Well she's still our concern," Tarzan said.

"Move away from the door," Layla said.

"No way!" Tarzan said. The door shook from under his weight.

"Just do it!" Eric said to Tarzan. They looked at one another. Tarzan bit his lip.

"You better be right about this," he said. "Salem get the door to Dr. Kandi's computer room. Everyone get ready to run in." Salem opened the door. The girls ran inside with Taz in his arms. Eric and Layla looked at one another.

"Don't screw me over," Eric whispered.

Layla gave a weak smiled.

"I'm letting go of the door," Tarzan said. Layla took a stance and started to transform into her Eraser form. Eric and Tarzan ran into room. As the hallway was empty. The cafeteria doors opened suddenly. Erasers practically toppled out on top of each other.

"They went this way!" Layla said, her voice was more of a vicious growl in this state though. She led the way down the opposite end of the hallway with a tail of Erasers after her. Eric watched from the crack in the door, then closed it behind him.

* * *

Tarzan joined our heap was me and Jason gripping and scratching each others throats. Soon it was just Tarzan and Jason scrambling over one another. However, Eric could take more than one Eraser easily. He grabbed Jason's shoulders and head butted him. 

Jason fell on the floor.

I grinned.

"Thanks," I said to him. The rest of the pride was inside too.

"An Eraser helped us!" Kitten said. My brow furrowed.

"Huh?"

"Long story," Tarzan said wiping a tiny cut on his mouth with his arm. "I thought you said Dr. Kandi was in here."

I looked around. The room was just a dark, dank office with a computer in the center of the room. Not a whitecoat in sight.

"She was. I don't know where she went," I said. "Oh well. Good riddance. Salem, go do your thing." I nodded for her to go on the computer. She walked up to the computer and put her hand on it. It immediately turned on. The screen flashed a million pages at once. Salem looked concerned.

"This makes no sense," she whispered.

"What?"

"There's nothing on here. Her documents, they all disappeared. There is absolutely nothing on this computer. That's impossible. Unless she did an emergency erasing and put everything on a disk," she said.

"Speak English!" Eric demanded.

"She took off all the important information while Cat and Jason were fighting!" Salem said annoyed with Eric as usual. "Moron."

"Salem, don't call Eric a moron. Everybody else, it was a good try, but I think its time to leave. I'm sure this opportunity will come up again," I said.

"Yeah, now let's get the hell out of here," Tarzan agreed. I was disappointed. I wanted to know what was going on. If this was a big test, if the whitecoats were just messing with us, or maybe we really had escaped on our own just because we were that awesome. But we weren't going to find out now. At least not anytime soon.

* * *

Phew, that was a big one. Anyway, believe it or not I'm running out of ideas. If anyone has any suggestions that would be helpful.

Thank you for the reviews everyone! You all rock!!!!! Love you guys! Keep reading!


	21. The Adventures of Burger King

Whoa... Heavy stuff. I hope you guys are liking it so far. Suggestions are welcome! Anybody want to know more about something about the characters? Review and let me know then I will use it as another storyline. I live to serve my great reviewers. But seriously, let me know!

I do not own Maximum Ride. ::sigh:: If only I did.

Everyone I created in this story is mine though!

* * *

That girl. What was her name? Lola? Lila? Layla! Yes, that was her name!

Layla kept the other Erasers busy. Don't ask me how, but she did. Salem worked through the security and got us out safely. No one stopped us. No one even complained when we high jacked one of the whitecoat's cars. Once again, I will point out, that it is TOO CONVENIENT!!!

We switched cars about three times to keep anyone from tracking us and stopped a few times to change Taz with diapers we swiped from Seven Elevens and ampm's.

But we're genetically enhanced mutants with super powers. When we gotta eat, we gotta eat a lot. Eric did something risky (and without my permission I might add) and pick pocketed some guy at a gas station. So I decided we all deserved a reward for another successful escape. We were going to eat at Burger King.

"I want the Double BacomnCombo!" Kitten said. I held Taz on my shoulder as he slept soundly.

"Chicken strips," Salem said with her dark furry face hidden inside her hood from the teenager cashier who wasn't paying much attention to us anyway.

"A number eight," Tarzan said much less enthused. We were locked up for a few days and his hair grows incredibly fast. Even when we had him shave everyday he had a permanent five o clock shadow. He hadn't had a chance to shave so he looked a lot like Brad Pitt when he had that mountain man beard, but at least it hid his fading bruises. We were all greasy and smelly.

"You got a triple anything?" I asked tiredly.

"We have a triple whopper combo with a..."

"I'll take it," I said.

"Same here," Eric chimed in hidden inside a hooded sweater of his own.

"And a kids meal," I added for Taz. Trust me. That little one year old could tear up a hamburger in seconds. Not to mention he would also try to eat the bag it came in, and one time he actually did eat the plastic toy. Choking hazard? Not for our little Taz.

It was about three in the afternoon. We were all incredibly tired. As we waited for our food Kitten leaned against me. Salem went to go save our table and within a minute she was asleep on her folded arms.

We took our food back to the table. Salem didn't so much as stir in her sleep as we sat beside her in the booth.

Kitten sat beside her munching into her burger.

"You want to explain about that Eraser girl," Tarzan started the inevitable conversation oh-so-tactfully. Eric stopped chewing and looked from me and back to Tarzan. I would have shot him a dirty look, but I wanted to know about the Eraser girl too.

"Her name is Layla," Eric started.

"I like her. She's pretty," Kitten said swinging her legs that didn't quite reach the ground.

"She said..." Eric started. He hesitated a moment.

"Eric, we need you to tell us everything," I said as nicely as sleep deprivation would allow me sound.

"She said she wanted to help me because... Because the whitecoats told her they wanted to breed us together," he finally got out. He took that opportunity to take an oversized bite to avoid from saying anymore. Tarzan and I exchanged looks.

"So..." I said carefully. "She thinks she's your mate?"

"If we get caught again, I guess I will be," Eric said.

"So she has a crush on you?" Kitten chimed in.

Salem giggled, her head still lying on the table with her arms as a pillow. Eric started to say something to her that was more than likely going to be rude.

"That doesn't make any sense. If she wanted to be your mate than why did she help us escape?" I asked.

"I didn't say she _wanted_ to be my mate," Eric said blushing somewhere underneath his hood.

Salem snickered again, but luckily restrained herself from saying what she was so clearly thinking.

"Maybe she wanted to avoid the breeding program as much as we did?" Tarzan suggested. "Maybe that's why Jason gave you your power back.

"It's possible," I said.

"Wow," Kitten said. We looked at her. "I mean, we think the Erasers are evil like the whitecoats. But really it seems like they're just like us. They don't want to make anymore mutants."

Sometimes it takes a child's innocence to make you see things from an unbiased perspective. We went on with our meals deliberately not commenting on Kitten's profound statement. We finished quickly since we were out in the open and everything and hit the road again.

There's one thing I learned about being on the road:

ALWAYS ORDER A LARGE DRINK!!! You can go into about any resturant and refill as long as no one notices the cup is from another fast food place. There's a tip for any of you kids on the road.

Another thing I learned:

ALWAYS DITCH ANY STOLEN DEBIT CARDS AFTER YOU USE THEM!

Even if you actually _did_ still the card, its still embarrassing when you hear the words, "We're sorry. You card has been declined Mr. Rotwoski."

Anyways, moving on. Tarzan was driving complaining that I had to sleep sooner or later and Eric looked too young to drive. Plus we were probably the more normal looking kids in the pride. Besides Taz of course because until he sprouts fur he looks like any other baby.

So I rested in the passenger seat of our latest car, which was blue mini van that smelled like mint.

"You are now leaving Salem," I read the sign out loud out of pure habit.

"What?!" Salem perked up.

"Relax, spaz. Salem was the name of the town we were in," Eric said. Salem leaned back in her seat.

"Oh. You named me after a town?"

"No. We named you after an obnoxious cat," Eric said.

"Both of you settle down," I said over my shoulder.

"Cat," said a familiar voice. Everyone in the car looked up. Then at Taz who was settled comfortably in a car seat that was in the van before we got in. Taz blinked his big baby eyes. He looked at me.

"Cat," he said again.

"He said your name," Kitten said unnecessarily. I smiled uncontrollably. Taz mimmicked my smile and started to laugh.

"That's right, Taz," I said. "Good boy."

"Cat," he squealed loudly seeing the attention he was getting from the new word he'd learned. I turned around in my seat quickly and faced the windsheild. I sniffed loudly and turned my head to look out the window. Tarzan laughed.

"Are you crying?"

"No!" I said defensively. But rebellious tears brimmed on my eyelids. Tarzan laughed again.

"Aw, Cat. You're such a softie," he teased. I still couldn't help but laugh with him.

"Don't laugh," I said purposely hitting him on one of his bruises on his arm.

"Ow!" I smiled for miles more as I looked out the window.

* * *

Awwww... 


	22. Cold French Fries and Dead Whitecoats

I do not own Maximum Ride! Yeah, do I have to write that _every time_? I mean, you all get the point by now, right? Oh well, I'll keep doing it just in case, but I will never stop complaining about it! NEVER!

But I do own everyone else in this story. So at least there's that.

* * *

I woke up and sat up straight in the car. I could feel my hair in knots behind my head. I scratched my head absently and reached for the glove box hoping there was a hair brush inside. There wasn't but I'd woken up Tarzan in my search. 

"Mornin," I said. He looked at me relieved and rubbed the bridge of his nose. We'd finally decided it was time to get rid of his giganto beard before birds started nesting in it so he was back to his old Prince Charming handsome self.

"Mmm," he groaned. We both looked behind us. Everyone else was sleep. Kitten was comfortably curled up pressed up against Taz's car seat. Salem and Eric were uncharacteristically leaning on one another. A long string drool was dripping from Eric's mouth onto Salem's hooded sweater.

"Should we get going?" Tarzan asked. I sighed.

"Nah, let them sleep for a while," I whispered. It was quiet in the van which was strange in itself. I reached down for some cold french fries in a paper McDonald's bag.

"Cold french fries," I muttered. "The breakfast of champions."

"Can you just picture having your face on a cereal box? We could call them French-Fry-O's," Tarzan said.

"And they'll come with a prize inside," I added as we laughed. "An edible plastic toy for little Erasers like Taz."

"Where do you think we are?" Tarzan said. I looked around. Well, wherever we were there was a lot of trees. It was foggy outside and the clouds were low. It was cillingly cold outside. The other kids were warm enough in their necessary hoodies, glove, and beanies. However Tarzan still had his wife beater and jeans. I wore something similar with a black tank top and jeans we'd stolen from the first house we lived in.

"I have no idea," I said honestly. That's when Tarzan sneezed. And let me tell you something, his sneezes are terrifyingly loud. I jumped and so did everyone else. Kitten's jump was the most literal though.

THUMP!

"Ow!" she complained groggily as she rubbed her head.

And now we had a dent on the roof of our van.

"Well, now that everyone's awake let's get going," I announced. Everyone groaned but still turned to put on their seatbelts.

"Why is my head wet?" Salem asked.

"I'm hungry," Eric complained. I tossed the McDonald's bad over my shoulder. Eric caught it midair and started to chow down.

* * *

Layla came to screeching halt as Jason held up his fist in a 'hold' gesture. Layla stopped running and let herself turn back from Eraser to girl. She coughed and put her hands on her hips to catch her breath. She stood beside Jason. 

"I thought you'd never catch up," Jason said. Layla offered him a rude gesture that involved one finger. "Where is it?"

"She said it would be in this spot," Layla said. The two turned around in a circle looking around the tree infested area. She pointed her long slender arm in the other direction. "There."

And there it was. A little wooden shack all alone in the wilderness. They made their way quietly, avoiding stepping on branches and pine needles on the ground.

"So... Good thing your boyfriend got away safe and sound," Jason commented as they made they're way.

"Screw you," Layla snapped back.

"Anytime, anywhere."

"Like I'd give you the pleasure," Layla grumbled. The only thing on the old shack that didn't look old and broken down was a key pad on the outside. She stopped and punched in the code. She stood back and let the door open.

The pungent smell hit the two senstive nosed Erasers like they had just run into an invisible wall.

"Blech! What is that?" Layla said covering her nose as she took a step inside.

"I know that smell," Jason said. Even he didn't seem to feel right about what they were doing. Layla's eyes widened as she made her way around the little table and saw a dead whitecoat on the ground. His chest was sliced open and his guts were well... everywhere. "Geez..."

There was a noise in the other room. Jason held up his hand motioning for Layla to not make another sound.

There was only one other room in the shack. The two Erasers made their way carefully following bloody footprints through a doorway. Jason took the liberty to opening that door. Inside there was various lab equipment scattered all over the room. The electricity was still running, the computer was on. It looked like every lab in the School was supposed to look.

Except for one thing.

There was a woman whitecoat cowering in the corner staring off into space as she rocked herself gently and muttered to herself. The mutant was in her computer chair with his feet up on the table. His long tail twitched from side to side.

"Look Maria. We have visitors," he said to the whitecoat who ignored him, but her body shook when he spoke up. "I was wondering when the School was going to collect their perfect assassin."

* * *

"Europe!"

"Australia!"

"Antarctica!"

"The moon!"

"Dah!"

I sighed and scratched my head. Tarzan gave me a smirk. I glared at him with a smile.

"Okay. I'll ask again. Where is someplace _reasonable _we can hide?"

"Wait, what exactly are we doing?" Eric said. I bit my lip. Now that was a good question. One I did not have the answer to. What exactly were we doing? Were we just going to keep running the rest of our lives? Was there something the whitecoats wanted us to do while we were out in the real world? My brain was going a million miles per hour trying to figure that out. I stuttered over my response.

"We're trying to find a place to hide," Tarzan answered saving the day.

"Yes! That's exactly right," I agreed thanking him with a look. He acknowledged me with a nod.

"What about Canada?" Eric asked. No one seemed to argue. I shrugged.

"Okay. Canada it is," I decided.

* * *

So there you are my wonderful readers! 


	23. Whatcha Gonna Do When They Come For You

Tarzan and I sat on the couch in our first house watching TV. I didn't want to watch Sesame Street, so we compromised by watching Teen Titans. (Awesome show!) We laughed and enjoyed one another's company on the blue floral pattern couch. It seemed normal enough.

"Hey Cat," Tarzan said. I looked at the space in between us. Our hands were clasped, fingers laced inside one another.

"Yeah," I said feeling a blush rise up in my cheeks.

"Hold on," he said in a dark cryptic voice. Our moment faded to his mood. The situation suddnely became very serious. Very fast. "Don't let go." I was about to question what he was talking about when the couch cushion he was sitting on abruptly collapsed.

He fell into the gap so suddenly I barely had enough time to grab him with my other hand. I tried to hold him as he dangled were the couch cushion once was.

"Tarzan!" I screamed. My hands were sweating. Our grip was slipping. The couch cushion gave way beneath him and fell into an endless abyss of water. He almost fell through my grasp. I pulled and pulled but my massive fellow mutant was just too heavy. The water seemed to be pulling him away from me.

"You don't have the strength!" Tarzan yelled. "You don't have the strength to be a good leader!"

"What?" I said shouting over the sounds of rushing water. I couldn't believe he was saying that! As if to prove his point, the water finally grabbed him and pulled him away from me. Our hands let go. I dove forward, but couldn't bring myself to fall into the water after him. I stretched my hand out to him for him to grab. "Tarzan! No!"

He disappeared into the blackness. And I had lost my friend forever...

I woke with a gasp claws ripping the upholstery of the car. I looked around wildly. The van was parked at another gas station. The driver's seat was empty. I assumed Tarzan was inside the mini mart stealing snacks or diapers for Taz. Eric and Kitten were engaged in another epic battle of rock, paper, scissors. Salem was leaning over Taz's seat.

"Say-lem," she said slowly to him. "Come on, say it. Salem."

"Cat!" Taz responded rebelliously. My heart still fluttered wildly in my chest. I looked down at my seat. Yellow foam and scraps of leather surrounded my seat. I swallowed hard and touched my head. It was just a dream. Just a dream...

"Hey Cat?"

"Yeah," I said putting on a mask of self confidence and leadership.

Tarzan was standing in the open door of the van.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Yeah. Why?" Tarzan looked away.

"No reason," he said.

"Let me drive for awhile," I said afraid of falling asleep right back into my horrific dream. Tarzan shook his head and started the van again. I undid my seatbelt. "No. Sorry caveman. You're not going to fall asleep at the wheel and steer us into oncoming traffic."

"I'm fine," Tarzan snapped moodily.

"No. You drove all yesterday and all morning. It's my turn," I argued. Tarzan rolled his eyes and grumbled something incoherent. He slammed his door as he reluctantly went around to trade seats with me. I ignored his bad mood. There was not a temptation in the world that would make me want to fall asleep again.

Jason drove the truck with Layla by his side. They were both uncomfortably quiet after the sight they'd seen in that shack. The secluded lab that was part of the School where they could work on their latest project. The perfect assassin.

Layla turned around to look at that assassin. He looked asleep as he sat there with his legs crossed, humming like in a trance. She shivered.

"He killed a whitecoat," she said.

"I know," Jason said.

"Are you not the least bit worried?" she asked.

"You mean for the kitties?" he asked skeptically. Layla scoffed and looked out the opposite window. "You mean your boyfriend." She whipped her head back around to face her. Layla couldn't suppress the rising growl in her throat. Jason smiled seeing that he'd succeeded in getting a rise out of his fellow Eraser.

"I swear to God, if you call him that one more time..."

"You'll what?" Jason challenged.

"I'm more worried about us. He's not an Eraser. He's not part of the pack. He's already turned on the whitecoats. What's to keep him from killing us too?" she asked lowering her voice so that the entranced assassin in the backseat couldn't hear. Jason took his eyes off the road for only a moment to look in the rear view mirror.

"We'll be fine," Jason said after a pause.

"I didn't kill him," said the one in the backseat. Layla and Jason both straightened at the sound of his voice. Layla turned around to face him. His silver slit eyes bore down into hers intimidatingly. He smiled with sharp intimidating fangs. "He killed himself."

"Well, whatever your story is for Dr. Kandi it better be good," Jason said as bravely as he could with the mysterious boy in the backseat.

A moment passed. The silver eyed boy let out a small chuckle.

"They don't call me the Perfect Assassin for nothing," he commented. "Just keep driving. Don't you worry your pretty head about nothing else." Layla touched her bare arms as goosebumps rose to her skin. She did _not _like this guy.

"Passport?" I said questioningly. I looked over my shoulder at Eric who was reading a magazine in the seat behind me.

"Eric? What's a passport? Or a birth certificate, for that matter," I asked. Eric was the most knowledgeable about the real world. He leaned forward in his seat.

"What?"

"They want to see ID at the toll booth up ahead to cross over into Canada," I said. Eric's eyes went wide.

"Turn around," he said.

"Huh?"

"Turn around!" he shouted just as an officer was walking towards our van. I slammed on the gas and spun the wheel. Tarzan was violently awoken by my turning so sharply and driving into oncoming traffic, that he was thrown into the window.

"What the hell!"

"Eric told me to turn around!" I cried defensively as I drove like a maniac over the island in the middle of the street, so you know, I'm not driving _against_ traffic on a freeway. This, of course, attracted a little more unwanted attention than necessary. Blue and red lights flashed behind us illuminating the night. I cursed under my breath.

"And you said _I_ was going to drive into oncoming traffic?!" Tarzan panicked.

"What do I do?" I asked alone shakily.

"Drive!" Tarzan said sitting up straight and gripping onto the armrest..

"Where?"

"Anywhere! Just run!" Eric shouted. I slammed down on the gas as hard as I could throwing everyone back against their seats.

Great. Now we had cops to run from in addition to the crazy whitecoats.

Perfect.

Once again I gotta thank my reviewers. You motivate me guys.


	24. What is a blog?

I do not own Maximum Ride. I do own my characters.

Yup.

* * *

"What's going on?" Salem asked sitting up in her seat. 

"Nothing we can't handle," I told her faking my confidence. Tarzan looked at me skeptically. I spared him a glance and shrugged my shoulders. Cars honked and I was driving the wrong way down a one way freeway. I stayed to the very left swerving into the emergency for cars that were too panicked or slow to move out of our way.

"Hey," Eric mentioned. "You're pretty good at this."

"Yeah, I kind of am," I said more surprised than immodest. Sirens blared behind us, but the police were having a harder time dodging traffic than we were. I don't know how I was doing so well. Inhuman reflexes? A natural car chase talent?

Who knew?

"They're falling behind," Tarzan said.

"They're way behind," Kitten said poking her head above the seat. I almost relaxed. Luckily the police had not been expecting us and as a member of a group of escapees you always had to be ready for this kind of stuff. But I won't deny that luck wasn't on our side that particular moment. And this time I knew the School had nothing to do with it.

"Make a sharp turn and try and get on the exit. We need a new car," Tarzan said.

"Stupid immigration laws. We also need to find a new destination," I muttered.

"Antarctica!" Kitten shouted. "I want to see snow."

"We need to stay in the country, Kitten," Eric said. I barely had enough time to see him hold onto her protectively, ready at a moment's notice to protect her in the event of a car accident.

"Get ready," I warned. Then braked and turned the wheel as hard as possible in a two hundred degree turn. The wheels spun noisily burning with the rough abrupt turn. The car scraped up against the divider. I flinched at hearing the metal hit the concrete. But Taz squealed from his carseat. Obviously this was the most entertaining ride of his life.

The point is that we got off the freeway even though we were in some random town in the state of Washington right next to the border of an inpenetrable country. We pulled over and abandoned our stolen van behind a super market.

It was night and we had taken such sparatic naps while on the road that everyone was on a different sleep schedule.

After making sure everyone was fine we started walking down the streets. Not the main streets, but streets next to houses. I mean, the cops wouldn't be looking for a bunch of teenagers with kids and a baby for wreckless driving. Right? 

Whether they were or not there we were as freaks of nature walking down the street. Kitten made Tarzan carry her on his back. I held Taz and Salem and Eric stopped bickering for the first time since the two had ever met to trail behind us.

"No, seriously. Where are we going now?"

"We can go to LA," Salem suggested.

"LA?"

"Yeah, Los Angeles," she said. "That's where they went when they were in trouble. Granted the Erasers kept on finding them there, but apparently there's a gang there that might help us." The rest of us exchanged confused looks.

"What are you talking about?" I was the first to ask the question.

"Duh," Salem said rolling her big yellow eyes. "The blog."

"What blog? What is a blog?" Tarzan asked.

"It's a thing where people write stuff. You guys don't know anything about computers," Salem said. No. Of course we didn't. We didn't even know how to turn a computer on without Salem working her magic. But that girl was an electrical genius. If it ran on power, she could figure it out and have it wired to her command in seconds.

"Where's LA?"

"California," Eric answered. "We'd have to go south."

"Didn't we just come from south?" Tarzan pointed out.

"That's right. Our trail might still be hot from our last escape from School. Not to mention we were just chased by the police and the last they saw us we were going that direction," I agreed. Salem rolled her eyes.

"Fine," she pouted. "Can we at least go to Disneyworld?"

"Cat, I think Salem's finally lost it," Eric said. I sighed heavily knowing that this would ignite the bickering again.

"I haven't lost it. I just don't see why the other kids get to go to Disneyworld and Europe and we have to run around like crazy all the time," she said. My stomach heaved. I slowed my pace. Taz shifted in my arms. We exchanged a look. He patted my blonde hair sympathetically.

"Uh oh," he said.

Uh oh was right.

"Other kids are normal. They can do normal stuff," Eric continued to explain oblivious the sudden nausuea that was rising up my throat. "We don't have that luxury constantly running for our lives."

"What are you talking about? These kids aren't normal," Salem said.

"What kids?" Eric snapped impatiently. Urgency struck me all of the sudden. I grabbed Tarzan by his shirt.

"Take Taz," I ordered practically throwing the baby at him.

"Are you okay?" Tarzan asked me. My eyes were wide as I steadied my stance. My head felt light. Like the world was spinning around me and I couldn't stop it. For a moment I thought I was okay. Maybe I'd just had a dizzy spell.

Then it struck even fiercer.

On top of the nausea were all my worst fears. Going back to School, getting prodded, losing one of my best friends, Erasers ripping apart my parents without me to stop them.

"Cat?"

I threw up and landed face down in it right there on the sidewalk.

* * *

Ewww...


	25. Power Struggle

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own, okay here's my updated list on my characters.

1. The pride (by now you should know who they are)

2. Jason

3. Layla

4. Dr. Kandi

5. The perfect assassin

Thank you my awesomtastic reviewers! I've made up a new word just for you!

* * *

I was all alone. There was blackness everywhere, like I was standing in an eternal pitch black room. I felt a cold chill knowing this loneliness was true. I couldn't hear another heartbeat or feet shuffling. Even my somewhat enhanced cat eyes couldn't make out anything in the darkness. 

"Do I have your attention?" a voice boomed like God speaking out from the heavens.

"I would love to give it to you, but I'm just so distracted by the _nothing_ all around me," I said sarcastically. "Of course you have my attention."

"Good," the somewhat cocky voice said. "Catherine Hallen."

I inhaled sharply. No one had called me that in years. The whitecoats had simply called me Cat. It wasn't until my parents found me that they gave me a somewhat normal name. Catherine Hallen, otherwise known as Cat.

"What are you doing?" the voice chided. I immediately went on the defensive, balling my fist at my side.

"I'm taking the pride away from danger. We're not staying in the School anymore," I said with my chin up high.

"You're weak." I thought about my dream. The one with Tarzan telling me all those awful things. How I wasn't strong enough to lead the pride. I shook my head of the thought.

"I am not!"

"You spoiled brat. Itex gave you a home. They took you from parents that didn't want you. That couldn't protect you," said the booming voice. This struck a strong chord. My breath were deep trying to exhale the steam from the boiling rage inside me.

"At least my parents came back for me," I said softly. The voice was quiet for a moment. I smirked. The booming voice seemed to have parental angst of their own.

"You're not doing the pride any good," said the boom after recovering from its hesitation. "Tarzan can lead the pride by himself. Maybe you should just fall in line."

"I got these kids out of the School. I can help keep them out. Besides, Tarzan and I are more like partners. It's not anymore my pride than it is his," I said.

"How many times have you screwed up so far?"

My confidence fell as I thought. The School probably had everything to do with our luck since we first escaped. I had been too blind to see it. Eric had been too young to see it. It took Tarzan and his natural deduction to point it out when it was already too late. And we were already recaptured.

I remembered ordering Salem to leave and get a car while we fought Erasers. I asked a _twelve_ year old to go outside and _drive a car_ with _lethal gentically enhanced experiments_ trying to rip our guts out. I remembered the moment when I had the tranquilizer gun in my hand. The Eraser had her head in a vice grip threatening to snap it. That moment had gotten us all captured. That capture had nearly gotten Tarzan beaten to death.

"You're not fit to lead," the voice told me softly. "Even now see where you are. See you holding yourself back as your friends try to carry your dead weight."

* * *

At that moment my eyes fluttered open. 

The sight of streetlights and the smell of car exhaust was welcomed compared the empty abyss I was at in that...dream? Vision? The sun was rising, turning the sky from a dull purple to a bright pink. The world bobbed up and down as I floated along down the sidewalk.

Wait. Floated?

No. I was being carried. I had taken Kitten's place on Tarzan's back for a piggy back ride. He strolled down the darkest, most deserted streets toward the center of the city.

"Hey, you awake?" Tarzan asked.

"Yeah," I said. My voice was raspy. I touched my face and grimaced. My face was sticky with dried blood and...what was that crusty stuff on my face?

"You threw up and passed out in it," Tarzan answered my question.

"Ewwww..." I groaned. Tarzan laughed. "Well, gee, thanks for fixing me up."

"I'm not touching your puke. I have a weak stomach," Tarzan said. I looked around.

"Where are the kids?"

"They took shelter in some kid's tree house. Eric's on watch until we get back," he said.

"You left them alone!?" I cried straightening as much as I could. "Wait, until we get back from where?"

"The hospital."

"Oh! Hell no!" I said squirming out of Tarzan's hold. I fell out of his grip suddenly and roughly on the concrete. I scraped my hands, but wiped them on my jeans so as not to worry anyone anymore. "We are going right back to the others. What if they get captured? We have no idea where the School is. We can't get in or out without each other."

"They'll be fine. Right now the only one in danger is you. We don't know what's wrong with you," Tarzan said.

"That's no reason to take me to a doctor. You know what they do to kids without parents? They send them to foster homes! Then of course there's the fact that I have a tail and only walk on two legs when I have to, oh yeah, and the claws under my fingernails!" I shouted. Tarzan was taken aback. I was being a little bit harsh, but it felt necessary.

"You're sick! What if you have some horrible, yet curable, disease! Then your death can be prevented," he said.

"Lot of good it'll do me. They can save me and then turn us all into the School. Then we can all die and rot there instead!"

"I don't care, Cat!" Tarzan exploded, his voice was a roar that could have rattled every house on the block. I swallowed hard. "Now quit arguing with me!"

"Make me!" I snapped. Tarzan grabbed my arm and in an instant whipped me around over his shoulders like he was carrying buckets of water on a pole. "Let me go, you jerk!"

"Stop fighting," Tarzan said, his face reddening with rage. I was pissed. _Nobody_ made me do something I didn't want to do. I'd had enough of that at School and I'll be damned if one of my own pride members was going to get into that habit. Then I resorted to the worst. I unsheathed my claws and locked them in his skin. Tarzan leapt surprised and stung. He dropped me on the ground for the second time. He turned baring his teeth, ready to drag me kicking and screaming. I did the same, now that I was on fours I was at my best. I crouched and growled.

Then suddenly we were both very aware of the woman across the street. Some poor lady had been out for a jog and had run into our scene. Her mouth was open. I was suddenly aware that she was seeing an enormous, nearly seven foot seventeen year old growling at a sixteen year old girl with extended black claws on the ground crouched like a dangerous feline.

Tarzan cleared his throat. I got up to my feet and coughed into my fist.

"Morning," I said nervously.

"Nice day out, isn't it?" Tarzan added innocently. The woman continued her jog. Only after our encounter it was more of a sprint than a jog. As she disappeared from sight I glared in Tarzan's direction. Her was bleeding from the mark I'd made on his back. I folded my arms dangerously and shot him a warning with a single look.

"Fine. But I swear to God, Cat, if you so much as cough funny I'm dragging your sorry tail into the emergency room," he said venomously.

I snorted. "You can try."

"Oh I will."

"Good."

"Fine."

"Whatever." We walked in silence as Tarzan led the way back to the kids. As I walked behind him I felt a surge of guilt. I was not going to be a danger to the pride. I was not going to be dead weight. That dream was wrong. I am strong enough to carry everyone to safety.

At least I hoped I was.

* * *

Once again, I love you all. Feedback is VERY much appreciated and keep in mind that I'll consider any suggestions you have.


	26. Mood Swings All Around, I'm Buying

I do not own Maximum Ride. How depressing...

At least I own my characters. I've grown quite fond of them all. Except for the ones you're not supposed to like. No, I take that back. I like them too.

* * *

Meanwhile in the middle of nearby forest Layla was asleep sprawled out over a log. She was dead tired. The past week had been one thing after another. Her hair was thrown over her face lazily and a string of drool fell over the bark like sap.

Jason winced. As pretty as she was, no one looked good with drool dripping down their chin. But she was finally in a deep sleep and that was exactly what he was counting on. He looked across the small fire they'd made at the perfect assassin. His oddly colored legs were crossed in the lotus position as he meditated as he'd been trained to do his entire life.

The perfect assassin sighed. His concentration was breaking. Jason saw his opportunity and took it. He went and sat down beside him. The assassin opened one eye to note who was sitting beside him and then closed it.

"So Mr. Assassin," Jason said mockingly. "I got a question. I think you'll know the answer."

"Maybe you can just go away and make an edcuated guess," the perfect assassin said grumpily. "You're interrupting my work."

"This is important," Jason said. He nodded toward Layla asleep on the other side of the fire. "Get in her head and figure out if she's going to do something stupid. I have a feeling she might be a liability."

"Funny. Cracking into oversized puppy's heads wasn't in the job description," the assassin said.

"She's helped the kitties before," he said.

"So have you."

"That was for my benefit," Jason said.

"All evidence shows that neither of you are trustworthy. I'll keep that in mind," the assassin said in a low almost purring voice.

"I'm not going to betray us. I need to know if she is," Jason said. The assassin closed his eyes and shifted the way he sat to a more comfortable position. He was ignoring him. Jason narrowed his eyes. When it came to mutants, he was in charge. The whitecoats trusted him the most. They gave him the most responisbility and that earned him the most respect. He was the alpha, right below the whitecoats. He was not used to someone defying him.

"Or you can just sit on your ass all day like you have been since Layla and I found you!" Jason roared.

The assassin shot him a look. Jason was immediately taken aback. His eyes were sharp and cold as a dissecting scapel. They were soulless like the whitecoats who could inject him and run test after test despite his screams and protests. But these were crazed. These eyes were violent.

Jason's ego only gave him the strength to endure the staring match for a moment. Once he couldn't take it anymore he lowered his gaze shamefully and clenched his jaw.

He couldn't stand the assassin's chilling presence anymore. With what little pride he had left, he stood up and walked back over to his space at the campfire. Jason ignored the smirk on the assassin's face as he walked away from the challenge of authority.

Layla woke up and yawned noisily. She saw Jason walk by her. His posture had changed from the broad shouldered, over confident young man, to a slumped over pissed off beta.

"What's wrong?" she asked. Normally she would dutifully ignore him and let him keep to himself. But if something was wrong that could shoot down his ego around the strange assassin, she knew it was important.

"I don't like this test," Jason grumbled. "I don't like that...that _kid_." The last sentence he practically spat on the ground. The assassin had gone back to his meditation out in the open field.

"He's creepy," Layla agreed.

"Creepy?! That kid has found a new level of creepy! He makes Damien look like a Brady Bunch kid," Jason whispered.

"You know he can probably hear you, right?" Layla said whispering as low as she could.

"Let's get out of here," Jason said daring the raise his voice to a normal volume.

"Huh?" Jason stood up and started walking toward the city. "What about the van?"

"Forget the van," Jason said over his shoulder.

"What about _him_?" Layla said jogging to keep up with his quick angry walk.

"The spawn of satan will be fine on his own," Jason said purposefully loud. "We were instructed to make sure he gets the job done. There he is sitting on his ass getting his job done. Mission completed! Let's go get something to eat or something." Layla looked back at the assassin and then back at Jason. She bit her lip and groaned.

There was no way she was going to be left alone with that maniac.

"Jason! Wait up!"

* * *

I was mad. I was depressed. On top of that I was mad that I was depressed and depressed about being mad. Tarzan climbed the wooden planks that were nailed to tree ahead of me. All the while I prayed no neighbors would see us huddled in some kid's treehouse. When we showed up in the tree house we were greeted by happy relieved faces.

This somehow made me sadder. Kids shouldn't have to sit and worry about their guardians coming home alive or at all. Kitten jumped at me. Her spring loaded jump nearly knocked me out the cut-out door. I had to grab the frame for balance.

"Easy, Kitten. She's not feeling well," Tarzan said peeling the little girl off of me.

"I feel fine," I lied. Actually, I was kind of wobbiliy. But I think it was going away so it was okay.

"What did the doctor say?" Eric asked.

"He didn't have to say anything. I'm perfectly healthy," I said with an award winning smile.

"We decided to wait a little bit and see if she gets better on her own. But I don't think we should be running around for a while. At least until she gets better," Tarzan said authoritively.

"It's too dangerous to stay still," I argued. "We have to keep moving."

"But I get car sick," Salem complained.

"We're not straying far from a hospital," Tarzan said. I glared at him again.

_Maybe you should just fall in line_. The voice from my dream was playing over and over like a broken record player. I shook my head of the thought. But I did not want to be what kept us here. I didn't want to be dead weight.

"There's a note in the kitchen in the house. It's instructions for a house sitter. The family's on vacation. Couldn't we just...I don't know... Occupy the house?" Eric said. Kitten smiled at the thought of having our own house again. She tugged on my arm and made her big green eyes unbelieveably cute. (Think Puss-In-Boots in Shrek 2) It was a hard look to ignore, but I made myself tear away from her cute little face.

"We'll get caught. Again!" I argued.

"No we won't! We'll be ready to run at a moment's notice!" Kitten begged like a kid would beg for a puppy.

"They did leave a car," Salem pointed out. "And I saw a computer! They could have internet and I could read more of the blog!"

"Can I have a talking dog?" Kitten asked randomly. I was caught dead in the barrage of people ganging up against me, to side with Tarzan.

"Yeah!" Taz agreed. Tarzan looked at me. His smug look was getting on my nerves.

"There's no such thing as a talking dog," I told Kitten. Her face fell like I'd just told her there was no Santa Clause.

"Actually, there is," Salem said matter of factly.

"Erasers don't count," I said.

"Can we at least stay here? At least until the family comes back?" Kitten whined.

"Can we?" Salem said mimicking the Kitten's patented cute face.

"Majority rules," Tarzan sang under his breath.

So I sighed. What choice did I have? "Fine," I said through clenched teeth.

"Yay!" Everyone cheered. Tarzan just smiled at me. I was not in the mood for that smile. That overprotective bastard.

* * *

How about that? What good times. Reviewers are my favorite! 


	27. Breakdowns May Cause Changes of POV

I don't own Maximum Ride. I own my characters.

Once again, I've run out of creative things to say. And I'm kind of on a roll so screw the disclaimer. I'll get on with the story.

* * *

There is one thing I will admit to you, the reader, and never ever to anyone in the pride. I love staying in a house. It's dangerous, but its sooooo comfortable! We can eat real food, and sleep with blankets, and not resort to thievery since we can always look for resources inside the house. It makes me feel more like a family when my pride and I are sitting around the TV fighting about whether we want to watch a soccer game, Terminator, Sesame Street (in Spanish), or Battlestar Galactica.

That's when you know you love the people you're with. When you can openly fight over the remote and somehow find a compromise.

We had settled on Battlestar Galactica. Eric's choice. Meanwhile Tarzan tolerated it beside me on the couch while I focused on sitting as far away from him as possible. However he refused to let me out of his sight. It was aggravating. I hated being treated like one of the kids. Whenever I scooted away, he scooted closer until I was trapped between an armrest and the giant of a mutant Tarzan was.

"Salem, I thought you said there was such thing as a talking dog," Kitten whispered.

"There is. Cat's wrong," Salem said. Somehow those words stung. Like I was losing my credibility or something.

I swallowed hard and focused on the show even though I had no idea what was going on. Apparently you have to be watching the show from the first season to really get what was going on. Eric seemed to pick up everything they said and pieced the story together like he'd been watching the show since it started. He tried to explain it to us, but none of us understood.

Oh well. As long as he was happy.

"Cat, can I sleep with you tonight?" Salem asked during the commercials.

"Praise the gods of television! They have TIVO!" Eric shouted triumphantly in the background.

"Sure, hun. Why?"

"Tarzan said he didn't want you to sleep alone just in case you got sick again," she said. Tarzan groaned. Salem winced.

"Oops. Was I not supposed to tell her that?" Salem asked biting her claw nervously.

"Salem! I can't work this thing. Use your electronic mojo and figure it out," Eric demanded throwing the TIVO remote toward her. She didn't even bother to try and catch it.

"Only if you say the magic word," Salem said back to Eric.

"Now?"

"The magic word is 'please', nitwit," Salem snapped.

"Yeah, Eric. Hasn't Elmo taught you anything?" I said. Then added for good measure, "Salem, don't call Eric a nitwit."

"Well, tell him to stop being one," Salem said. I sighed and shook my head. Suddenly my face flushed angrily.

"That's it! You're pairing up with Kitten tonight. I'm going to sleep alone," I said surprisingly angrily. The pride turned around at the sharpness of my voice. I shouldn't have let them see my agitation. I should have just swallowed my insecurities.

Luckily the awkward silence was broken by the show returning from commercial break. Eric swivled his head around once again involved with the story unfolding.

I was absolutely ashamed of myself for ruining a perfect family moment.

"I'm going to bed," I said. I went to the room where we had left Taz. He was standing up in the old playpen we found in the garage. Yeah. Like that would hold him for long. I closed the door behind me.

_That was a bit harsh. You ever think the pride might be better off without you completely_? said the booming voice from my dream. I fell to my knees and collapsed into tears. Snot ran down too making me just a ruined mess. I heard the sound of the play pen toppling over. The first thing that popped in my head was Erasers! School! Run!

But it wasn't. Taz had dutifully thrown himself against the wall and ripped through his pj's to take on the form of an Eraser. With that he toddled toward me. I was still knelt down on the floor. Taz walked in his awkward one year old way and hugged me.

"Cat," he said sympathetically. I tried to cry any harder. Sooner or later the others might here me. I'd shown them too much weakness already.

"Thanks buddy," I said returning Taz's hug. I kissed him on the top of the head and held him. Suddenly I was emotionally exhausted. I thanked Taz once more, kissing him on the cheek and set the play pen back up. I settled him back in and draped a blanket that was too big for a baby over him.

With that I fell asleep in the kid's bed who probably owned that tree house we were in. But my dreams were plagued. So plagued that I cannot be the one to narrorate this story anymore. It's someone else's turn.

* * *

For those of you who are confused, don't worry. It will come together. But Cat won't be narrating anymore. So we're switching POV. Keep in mind this is temporary, but it might last a few chapters. If you don't like it bear with me for a while. If you do like, enjoy it while it lasts. 


	28. Calling For Back Up

I do not own Maximum Ride!

But I do own my characters! So there! Okay, I hope no one's too pissed off about the POV change. If you are, I'm sorry! Just hang in there a bit. This is kind of crucial to the story.

* * *

**Salem's POV:**

Hi everyone! I'm taking over for Cat because of her...um... situation? Yes, situation is a good word. She was fine for a little bit. She was walking around taking care of Taz, ignoring Tarzan, and shooting me and Eric dirty looks everytime we started fighting. (But you try not fighting with a jerk like that!)

There was one very big difference though.

"Cat?" Tarzan said. Cat blinked, but didn't look up from her cereal. "I know you're mad at me, but is that any reason to use the silent treatment on everyone?"

We were all concerned. Cat stopped talking.

See! Now you see why I have to narrate!

This was seriously killing the mood. How can I enjoy my Lucky Charms (Which I never get to have) when Cat was doing this? Tarzan put down his spoon.

"Cat?" he kept on saying. He waved his hand in front of her face. She looked at him, her face sad and solemn. We'd never seen her like this before. She always looked like she was ready to say something motherly or kick ass. But not now. She looked like she had cried every tear her body could produce and just couldn't cry anymore. She look like...

She had given up.

"Cat? If you don't say something, I'm going to take you to the doctor," Tarzan threatened wagging his finger in her face. She blinked again, not saying anything.

"That's it. Come on, Cat. I don't care if its the middle of the day. I'm dragging you to the hospital," he said standing up and pushing his chair back that squeaked noisily on the tile floor. He held out his hand. "And don't even try to argue with me..."

Cat grabbed his hand. She stood up and straightened her clothes ready to go.

Shock rippled across the table. Kitten, Eric, and I exchanged looks. Tarzan nodded.

"That's right," he said almost stuttering with shock. "Let's go to the doctor." He let go and Cat walked in front of him leading the way out the door.

"Eric. You're in charge," he said over his shoulder. And just like that the two oldest were gone. Again.

Kitten started to sob. Eric groaned and held his head with his elbows on the table.

"Here we go," he grumbled. "It's okay Kitten." Kitten, the girl who had attached to me like a little sister even before Cat had rescued us, started to cry even harder.

"It's not okay!" Kitten said. She slammed her fist down on the table with unnatural strength. Eric and I jumped, but recovered quickly. "Cat's going to die." I felt my face fall with shock.

"Don't say that!" I snapped.

"She's sick!" Kitten argued.

"No, she's not!" I said. That sentence even made Taz look at me unbelievingly. "I mean, maybe, but nothing's wrong with her." Now they were looking at my like _I _was crazy. No offense, Cat. But I'm not the crazy one here.

"What do you mean?" Eric asked. I rolled my eyes.

"Never mind. I'm going on the computer," I said. I left a half full bowl of Lucky Charms and milk out on the table. There was only one way I knew how to solve this problem. And that was to turn to someone who had more experience living with a bunch of mutant escapees from the School.

I went on the computer and touched the sides. Of the monitor. It blinked on as I ordered it to and I waited for it to boot. Meanwhile I heard Eric complaining about me leaving food out. Taz whined from his high chair until Eric gave the bowl to him. Eric yelled from the kitchen letting me know I was going to clean up his mess.

I didn't care. This was important.

I pulled up Internet Explorer with a single thought. My FAVORITE website came on the screen. It was, you probably guessed it...

Fang's Blog.

Immediately I pulled up an email and started to compose.

_ Dear Fang (and the rest of the Flock), _

_ I am not just a fan, but a comrade. You see I'm a mutant like you from the School. Actually, Cat told me you inspired her to make us leave, so thank you. But you see, we're kind of in jam. Cat was the leader. Now she suddenly won't talk. I don't know what's going on with her. Tarzan took her to the doctor.  
You think that's a bad move? I know you guys went to Dr. Martinez when you were in a jam.  
Anyways, I'm the only one who actually goes on the internet so no one else really knows about what you guys do. But I do! And I think its awesome what you did to Itex. But I don't get it. How come the School is still there if you took out the whole Itex place?_

Please email me back and keep flying,  
Salem

There. I sent it and released a breath. Wow... I actually emailed the Flock! What if we get to meet them! What would I say to them? Would Tarzan let me steal Total?

From the kitchen I heard a familiar crash. Milk and Lucky Charms splattered all over the kitchen floor somewhere behind me.

"Uh oh," Taz said.

"Salem! That's your mess! Pick it up!" Eric said from the other side of the house. I groaned and got up from the computer chair.

* * *

"Won't the whitecoats notice that three hundred dollars were used at the mall?" Layla asked. Despite her worrying, she had a giant smile on her face. She wore new jeans and a brand new shirt. She was careful to buy easy stretch clothes for when she had her transformation in emergencies. On top of that she had a bag full of accesories in each hand.

Jason on the other hand had a brand new outfit as well. But he'd spent his money on a Nintendo DS. He dragged his pen across the screen as she and him walked through the woods following the assassin's scent.

"I'd never used the company card before. They never said specifically what I was allowed to spend it on. Even if they do get mad, I'll take the heat," Jason said waving the problem away like a fly. Layla smiled.

"Gee..." she said. "Thanks." Layla was pleasantly surprised today. Jason hadn't been such a horrible person to hang out with. And her first trip to the mall was everything she dreamed it would be, even with him there.

Jason stopped abruptly as they got to the clearing the three were staying at. Layla nearly bumped into him. She stopped just in time.

"What?" she said trying not to sound annoyed and ruin the first actual nice day she'd had in her entire life. Then she saw what had stopped him. The perfect assassin was standing up and walking around with his hands in his pockets as if for a stroll.

"You two have fun?" he asked pointing at their bags.

Layla met his eerie gaze. She shivered.

"Yup," Jason said recovering from his presence as quickly as possible. "Did you have fun?"

"Yup," the assassin said mimicking him. He walked right by him. Jason watched the shorter mutant stop and stand next to Layla. She moved closer to Jason as nonchalantly as possible. "And by the way my mission is finished. Well, its almost finished. But I'm done with you two."

Jason and Layla exchanged glances.

"So now we head back to the School?" Layla asked hopefully. The assassin shook his head.

"No. Now I take my rightful place in the pride," the assassin said. The Erasers were at once on their guard. They dropped their brand new belongings on the ground. Before either of them could sprout one strand of fur in transformation, the assassin sent out a mental blast. The shockwave into the Eraser's heads were enough to send them collapsing to ground like marionette puppets with no puppet master.

The perfect assassin's growl turned into a purr as he made his way into the woods and toward the city. Toward the pride.

* * *

Suspenseful!!! Is it not? Who do you think the perfect assassin is?


	29. Never Piss Off An Eraser

Thanks for the great feedback guys! It's been really great causing my characters psychiatric trauma. I do not own Maximum Ride. I do own all of my wonderful psycho characters.

* * *

**Salem POV continued:**

I was starting to get worried. It was almost dinnertime and the Flock still hadn't emailed me back. What if something had happened to them? I kept my mind on the computer all day long just hoping for a response. Eric paraded around like a jack ass in charge until Tarzan came home with Cat right behind him. He looked defeated as he walked in the back door.

"I couldn't do it," he said.

"What?" Eric asked putting Taz on the ground and letting him run like mad.

"I couldn't take her in. I was afraid. These people don't know what she is. They don't know what we are. What if they want to study her or take to someplace just like the School for experiments. I just...couldn't do it," he said. Cat had a blank stare on her face. Taz ran up to her leg. She picked him up and carried him to the other side of the house without a word.

I had never seen Tarzan look so worried. He watched Cat like a hawk, but watching her only seemed to make him more depressed. He looked so helpless. Seeing the two older kids like that worried me. I turned back toward the computer.

"Hurry Fang," I whispered under my breath.

Suddenly there was ding sound in my head like a microwave that had finished cooking.

"Email! I got an email!" I shouted uncontrollably as I ran right by Tarzan. He barely had enough time to move out of the way to let me pass. I squeezed by him ignoring him right to the computer. With a single thought I pulled up my email and started to read.

_Salem,_

_Thank you for being such an imaginative fan. However I can assure you that School is out. Forever, if you'll pardon the pun. But if you really are having problems with this Cat girl who isn't talking maybe you should take her to a psychiatrist or something? The whitecoats are through._

_Fang._

"No! No they're not through!" I shrieked.

"Salem, what is your problem?" Eric shouted. I ignored him as I typed furiously.

_Dear Fang, _

_I realize you probably think I'm lying. You probably think I'm just a fan. (Granted, I am also a fan.) But I am also an experiment! I am covered in black fur with claws, you have to take me seriously. None of us know what to do! We are down one leader! The Erasers are going to come barging in like they always do any day now. We have to fix Cat now. Please. You have to believe me!  
Didn't you have people who didn't believe you when you were first blogging? And then you got all these kids all over the world to take down Itex. What would have happened to Max, Nudge, and Angel if that had happened?_

_Your #1 Fan and fellow experiment,  
Salem_

_P.S. I think you were kind of hard on Ari. Taz in an Eraser and he isn't so bad. He does smell a little bit though, but I think that's more because he's a baby. _

_P.S.S. Faxness rules!_

I sent it quickly without even doing a spell check.

Then I waited. And waited. I drummed my fingers on the computer desk. And waited some more.

Come on, Fang! Hurry it up!

"Maybe, you should do something to pass the time," Kitten said from behind my chair. I sighed and shook my head. "Maybe we can go to the park down the street and kick the soccer ball around?" That was a strange request. I turned around and saw no one there. There was just the dark wooden furniture that had always been in the office. My brow furrowed in confusion.

She sounded like she was right behind me.

"Kitten?" I called.

"Yeah," Kitten asked walking into the computer room with a banana in her hand.

"Were you just-...?" I started to ask. Kitten chewed her banana noisily. "Never mind. Do you think Tarzan would even let us go to the park?" Kitten looked just as confused as I felt. Like I had just said something completely random.

"I dunno," she shrugged. "He's in Cat's room trying to talk to her right now." I was frustrated. I was mad. I pulled up another email and did a search on the photo that had gotten us in so much trouble the last time. The cat girl photo from the tabloids. I attached it to the email and sent it to Fang. If that wasn't enough proof than I didn't know what was.

One minute went by. Another minute went by.

I groaned frustrated.

Another minute.

"I can't take this anymore!" I said gripping my black hair. Kitten was standing right behind still chewing her banana.

"Get the soccer ball. We're going to the park," I said.

"How did you know I found a soccer ball?" Kitten said.

"Just take it and lets go. I'm going to go crazy cooped up in this house," I said. It was too nerve wracking sitting here watching our leaders fall apart and waiting for our lifeline, that probably wouldn't even return my message because they thought I was some crazy fan! On top of everything I was bored!

Bad things usually happened when I was bored. This was no exception.

Kitten went to the kids room and picked up the soccer ball. Meanwhile I remembered seeing a ski mask in the parent's room. Why did they have a ski mask? Who knew? Maybe they were robbers. Maybe they just liked to ski. Oh well, I was going to were it now. No way I was going to get my but photoshopped in the tabloids again.

Kitten bounded into the room with a beanie on her head.

I had my gloves, sweater, and ski mask.

"Let's go play some ball," I said dramatically. Kitten giggled and followed behind me. On our way down the hall we stopped by Cat's room. She was lying down in bed just staring at the ceiling. Tarzan was in the chair beside her reading one of the kids books in his oversized hands.

I swallowed hard and walked right by them. I was already doing my part to help Cat. Now I was just playing the waiting game. I deserved a little worry-free time.

Right?

Yeah. I did, I decided quickly. Kitten and I walked right by Eric.

"We're taking out the trash," I lied over my shoulder as we left. It was a lie misspent. There was a Battlestar Galactica marathon on. He didn't even spare me a passing glance. I shrugged.

Oh well. It was probably for the better. We went outside and made our way down to the park.

* * *

"I hate cats!" That was the first thing Layla woke up to. She blinked and looked up. How did it get so late? Oh. Right. The assassin. She jolted up to a sitting position. Jason was sitting on a nearby boulder. He glanced at her.

"Good. You're awake. Let's go kill that son of a bitch," Jason snarled. Layla shook her head and held it.

"Wait, what? You want to go after that psycho?" Layla said. Her eyes suddenly went wide. "Where's the stuff we got at the mall?"

"I will read you that snot's note he left us," Jason said. He walked over to where she was on the ground and offerred his hand to help her up. She took it gratefully and immediately they started to walk.

"Dear Erasers," Jason started. He looked to Layla. "That's us."

"I gathered that," Layla said with an appropriate amount of sarcasm.

"As you've probably already figured out, I am leaving to join the pride. That is once Cat is dead of course. After that justice is served I will take my rightful place in the pride and probably be their leader. I will deliver the pup Eraser to the School. I have taken the things you wrongfully purchased at the mall and returned them for money. The pride will need it.

I have also taken the van. So have a nice walk."

"He backstabbed us! That little prick!" Jason cried. Layla almost felt like crying.

"He _returned _all the stuff we bought at the mall?!" Layla cried outraged. She and Jason looked gazes. "We have to kill him," Layla said. Jason was mildly surprised that she had come to that conclusion without him having to do any convincing.

"How do we kill a super mutant with the power to get into someone's head and make them do whatever he wants?" Jason asked. He thought for a moment. Then he had a smug grin across his face.

"What? You know how to kill him?" Layla asked skeptically.

"No. I can do one better," Jason said. "What we are about to do is never to be spoken of again. Even if the whitecoats have a scapel to your throat. You understand?" Layla hesitated. Then she nodded vigorously.

"Good. Whatever I do, just follow my lead," Jason said. He transformed to his monstorous figure and started to sprint. Layla fell on all fours and sprinted after him, stumbling to keep up and continue her transformation at once.

* * *

Everything is going according to plan... Mwahahahaha!

My reviewers are so awesome. I love every last one of them! You guys rock! Thanks for the consistent feedback!


	30. The Reject

I do not own Maximum Ride! I do own my characters.

I hope you guys are enjoying so far. Until just recently I've been writing whatever comes to mind, but now that I have a grand master plan its going to get wild.

* * *

**Some more Salem POV:**

"What made you want to come play soccer at the park?" Kitten asked. I ignored the question, too mad to talk. The park was deserted. We were alone with stadium lights beating down on us from a baseball game that had just ended. It wasn't too hard to see. Our cat eyes are better than human eyes so it wasn't nearly so dark. I was mad though. I was frustrated and anxious.

I kicked the ball at the net. It bounced off the pole. Kitten just watched saying that she was refereeing. How can you referee when you're not playing against anyone? I don't know. Ask her.

"No good," Kitten said as the ball tumbled over to her.

"I can't believe we have to sit here and wait for a response!" I said.

"From the Flock?" Kitten asked.

"Duh! Who else?" I said. "They're the only people who can help us and they might not even believe us." I kicked the ball again. This time it sailed over the top of the goal right into someone else's hands. Kitten and I stopped. She got up from her cross legged position on the grass.

The person who had caught the ball put the soccer ball under his arm and walked toward me. He was barely taller than me and covered in black the same way I was. He had a ski mask on and gloves over his hands.

"Can I play?" he asked. I looked to Kitten. She shrugged and scratched her ear under her beanie. I nodded toward him.

"What's with the get-up?" I asked with the same defensive venom Cat had when she was backed into a corner.

"I have a skin condition. I don't get to go out much in the day time so I play at night," he said crossing the field toward me. "What's with your get-up?"

"Skin condition," I said. "I'm allergic to light." I winced beneath my ski mask at the lie. Allergic to light? Was that even possible?

The boy stood in the goal and got into a position as a goalie. He tossed me the ball back. I caught it and dropped it to my feet ready to kick.

"Shouldn't be too hard. She really sucks," Kitten commented. I felt my cheeks burn up underneath my mask and underneath my fur.

"Kit!" I whined. Kitten giggled.

"What? You do," she said. The boy giggled.

"What's your name?" he asked. I kicked the ball. He jumped with amazing reflexes and blocked it, slapping it back to me.

"Salem," I said. I probably shouldn't have said my real name. "This is my sister, Kitten." And Kitten's.

"Hi," Kitten said sweetly.

"I'm Hunter," the boy in the mask said. Kitten looked at me. I knew what she was thinking. This kid was suspicious. We were all alone out here. Tarzan wasn't here, Cat was incapacitated, and Eric was glued to the television. As soon as I started thinking about leaving a rogue thought popped in my head.

Or I could just stay.

"So," I said. "Hunter." I kicked the ball and smiled as this one had miraculously gotten by his inhuman reflexes. "You live around here?"

"Right now. But I'm not from here," he said.

"Where you from?" I asked casually. I kicked and this time I wasn't so lucky. He caught it in midair.

"I'm from the same place you are," he said. He kicked the ball to me again. Once more I looked at Kitten. She had a matching worried look on her face.

"And that would be?"

"The School," he responded. That moment should have triggered a series of events. Suddenly I knew. He was an Eraser! Jason would somehow appear behind me and grab me from behind. I would kick as I could, which would do no good. Kitten would jump an astounding leap on the nearest Eraser and scratch at him. If we both got free we would run straight home and warn the pride.

I froze in place waiting for these things to happen. But instead Hunter took off his mask. I gasped and covered my mouth. Kitten walked over and stood by me. This boy had tan, almost yellowish skin and the same yellow eyes I had. His skin was covered with large black spots. His hair was black like a normal boy's but his eyes captured me.

They looked like ruthless cat's. A killer in the jungle.

"I'm a cat like you," Hunter said.

"Wow," Kitten breathed. We were both stunned. Standing there stupidly.

"The sixth cat," I said. "You're the sixth cat experiment."

"A member of the pride," Hunter said walking towards us. I felt somewhat coverage I was wearing. I took off my hood and then my mask. I sometimes felt self conscious about the way I looked. The black fur that covered me completely.

"You know about us?" Kitten asked.

"Of course," Hunter said. "I've been with you all along. You see my talent, much like your talents with electricity and your talent to leap at amazing heights, is to get into people's heads. To make people do things. Like, oh say, the police forgetting who they were chasing when you tried to cross the border. Or you, Salem, thinking that you heard Kitten's voice suggesting you come to the park."

I tried to think for a moment about what else he could have done. The Erasers helping us?

"Everything I do is for the good of the pride," he said. There was something villianous about his tone. His vibe was all wrong. Maybe there was an animal instinct that told me this. A sixth sense perhaps. Then it occured to me.

"Cat," I said. "That's what's wrong with Cat! It's you!" Hunter blinked in genuine surprise. He sighed.

"Salem, please understand. She is not good for the pride," Hunter said holding up his hands defensively.

"What are you talking about?" Kitten demanded.

"CAT! Please come back!" came a voice from down the street.

"Where is she going?" Eric's voice followed. "Should I stay and watch Taz?"

"He'll be fine!" Tarzan said. "Hurry up! She's going to kill herself!" At that moment Cat ran by the park. She was on all fours, claws scraping the ground. I'd never seen her run so fast in her life. Tarzan ran, but he wasn't as fast as her. He was large and brute. Not built for speed like Cat was. But he was trying.

"Kill herself?" I cried looking in Hunter's direction. I narrowed my eyes accusingly. "You made her suicidal!"

"She's not worth living," Hunter said. He was breathing heavily now. Cat must have really done something to piss him off. "She knew that there were six cats. Even after she found out the pup was an Eraser did she bother to look for me? No. She was in charge. She made the executive decision to leave me in that hell hole! We don't need someone like that in the pride."

"You can't do that!" Kitten said trying not to cry again.

"It's already done. Even if I wanted to reverse it, its too late now," he said cryptically. I wondered what he meant by that.

"We do need her! We've been lost ever since you put her under your...spell!" I wish I would have found a better word to call it than that.

"I can take her place!" Hunter said pointing to himself. "I can lead this pride on my own!"

I looked down the street. Cat was heading towards the hospital. There were lots of ways to kill herself in there I realized.

"You're sick," I hissed. Kitten was quiet, but her look of disgust and anger matched mine to a tee. "We'd all rather die in School than let you join the pride." Hunter's face fell in disappointment. That little sentence had hurt him much more than I intended. And I was glad. I turned in the direction that Cat had run in.

"Now if you'll excuse us, we're going to go rescue our pride member," Kitten said with Cat-like arrogance. I smirked and patted her head. With that we were off leaving Hunter in our dust hurt and distraught with rejection. Good.

* * *

All is revealed! How about it folks?


	31. Regrets

I do not own Maximum Ride! But here's who I do own:

1. The pride

2. Jason

3. Layla

4. Dr. Kandi

5. Hunter (otherwise known as the character formerly know as the perfect assassin)

"Get on with it, already!"

Okay, sheesh...

* * *

Hunter recovered from the shock of Salem's rejection as quick as possible. He shook his head and cleared his mind. He would have to get moving. He wasn't going to miss the show Cat was going to put on. He wouldn't miss her death for the world.

Some people like to read, some people have sports. Hell, some people even knit.

Hunter's hobby was reading his victim's thoughts. It always happened right before they died. The last second of regret. The confusion of why they were killing themselves in the first place. He loved those thoughts. Those pure, agonizing thoughts...

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

Hello! I missed you guys. I'm glad all you readers have showed up for my death. Oh, wonderful sweet death. No longer did I have to be a burden to the pride. No longer did they have to worry about me or care about me. They can spend their time worrying about each other, not me.

I ran on all fours right into the hospital. I had to be fast. Eric and Tarzan were right behind me. And hello?! Who's watching Taz? No one! It didn't matter. Once I was gone they could watch him as much as possible. He can grow up to be an almost normal little boy because no one would steal his time by worrying about me anymore.

Nurses and doctors looked at me completely shocked. I smiled at them all, twitching my tail from side to side.

"Get out of my way!" I cried. Yes, I'm talking again. I'd decided to open my mouth when Tarzan had decided that he wouldn't leave my side until he knew I was okay again. He couldn't waste that time on me. Here's how it went down.

I was relaxing in my bed. Thinking about my existance. How I would be so much more useful dead. And there was Tarzan refusing to leave my room and falling asleep in a chair because of it. As soon as I made the decision to die, I felt so much better. Like there was there was this sudden relief upon me. But just because I'm suicidal, doesn't mean I'm not courteous. I had to say good bye.

"Tarzan," I'd said surprising him out of his doze. I smiled at him. "Don't worry about me. Not anymore."

"I can't, Cat," Tarzan said. He picked up my hand. There was a sudden strange heat from his hand. His palms were sweating like crazy. So were mine. He felt it too and dropped my hand as quickly as he'd picked it up. "I won't. You can't make." That's when I smiled and patted his hand.

"Yes. Yes, I can," I said. "I'll take care of myself. Good bye. You're my best friend." With that I jumped forward knowing he wouldn't be expecting me to suddenly leap to my feet when I had been sulking all day. He put the pieces together pretty quickly. Then he started to chase me. That's pretty much how we got here at the hospital. It was ten stories tall. (The top floors were used for med school classes.) That was more than tall enough to kill me if I jumped. So a jumping I will go...

The doctors and nurses were not expecting me or the freak so I had brought along. Tarzan, followed by Eric. His hood was down and his stripes were there for everyone to see.

"I said get out of my way!" I shouted charging toward the stairs. That's when people started to run, scream, and hit the floor.

"Oh no you don't!" said Tarzan. "You're not leaving me alone, Cat!" His footsteps thumped with each stride. My lovable giant friend, I thought at first. I'm so lucky to have friends who will try and stop me from killing myself. But then he grabbed my tail. I was yanked back to my feet. That jerk!

I spun around and kicked him in the face. The blow was more surprising than painful.

"Let me do this!" I shouted at him as I got to my feet and continued running. Up another stairwell. And another. Someone had tripped the fire alarm by the time I got to the fifth floor. I was panting. I was tired. But you know what they say. I can sleep when I'm dead.

Finally I got to the rooftop. I opened the roof access door and was greeted immediatley by a fist. I staggered backward and fell right in Tarzan's arms. I opened my eyes (as much as I could after that blow, I was going to have at least one black eye. Or at least I would if I were alive for it to bruise) and saw who it was.

Eric came through the access door having finally caught up with us.

"Layla?" he said. The girl Eraser stopped.

"You got her?" she asked Tarzan. He nodded. Tarzan blinked.

"Why are you helping us? Don't you want her dead too?" Tarzan asked. I stopped struggling in his hold for a second, curious for the answer. Layla shrugged.

"Right now, her survival is more important," she said.

"Important how?"

"It will piss off the guy that screwed me and Jason over. That's how," Layla answered. Tarzan's hold on me slacked. Now was my chance. The edge of the roof was right there! I wriggled out of his hold too fast for Tarzan or Layla to realize it. They ran after me. But I reached sweet freedom before anyone else could stop me.

I bounded off the ledge with the grace only a feline could possess. The wind of the air rushing past me felt great. But then something strange happened. I looked down. Ten stories is a LONG way down.

Wait, a second. Did I just jump off a building?

WHAT THE HELL WAS I DOING?!

"Cat! No!" Tarzan's voice cried as I fell to my doom.

* * *

Whoo! OMG! This is so exciting to write. I'm bet I'm having more fun writing it than you guys reading it. For those stuck on the cliffhanger. I'm sorry! I'm updating as soon as I can!

To all my reviewers, I love you all! Big hugs for each of you. You know who you are.


	32. Revenge of the Freaks

I do not own Maximum Ride! But I do own my characters. Sorry bout the cliffhanger peoples! I'll fix it right now.

* * *

You know how right before you die your life is supposed to flash before your eyes. I decided against that seeing how my life was kind of depressing. Instead I focused at the ground rushing up at me like a giant hand coming up to swat a fly. I imagined people finding my body after I went splat on the ground. They probably wouldn't even know it was a body. It would just be a pile of goo that people step in and go, "Eww..." 

Wait a minute. That thought was kind of depressing too. And kind of gross.

So instead I thought about Tarzan. How he hadn't left me during all that time. That was nice of him. And the kids? Well, I wish I could apologize to them. They have enough to tell their future therapists without adding me jumping off a building to the picture. The wind whipped at me making my eyes tear as the impending doom grew closer and closer, faster and faster.

The ground rushed up at me.

_Here it comes._

Almost there.

I closed my eyes. Then a freight train hit me from the side. Freight train? No, not a freight train. Whatever it was it snatched me right out of the air knocking the breath out of me. When I landed on the ground I landed on something soft. I opened my eyes and saw a the face under me. Any other time I would have been terrified.

Now I didn't know what to say.

"Jason?" I asked. My heart was fluttering wildly inside me. The adrenaline made my body shake violently. The Eraser pushed me roughly off of him. I rolled to my feet on the concrete. Then stood up. I turned around and saw a spotted boy standing beside me. He looked mad.

I could feel the danger radiating off of him. I stood up beside Jason. Now someone has got to be _pretty_ scary to make me stand beside him.

"You saved her!" the boy shouted. His voice boomed down the street.

"You. You're a cat," I said suddenly realizing his spots were that of a jaguar or lepoard. He shot me a look.

"You were supposed to die," he said clenching every muscle in his body in frustration.

"Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you," I said putting on my game face. But something was bothering me. I turned back to Jason. "Wait. You saved me? Again?"

"Yeah. And I'm getting real sick and tired of it so get your act together, freak!" Jason snapped at me.

"Cool it, Fido," I snapped even though I just wanted to give him a big hug. I mean, come on. I have some pride.

"Both of you, stop!" the boy balling his fists and stomping on the ground. A little immature of him. He had to be about thirteen. "You don't deserve to live, Cat!"

"Excuse me! Who the hell-..." Salem and Kitten rounded the corner joining our gunslinger stand off. "...heck are you?"

"I'm the perfect assassin. I've never failed in killing someone before!" the boy shouted.

"Looks like you just did," Salem said standing beside me. Kitten jumped on me nearly knocking me over.

"You're alive!"

"No one wants you, Hunter. The pride doesn't want you," Salem said.

"And we certainly don't want you," Jason added.

"So why don't you just get lost, reject," I said. But seriously. I had no idea who this kid was. Oh, the sixth cat. A cat had tried to kill me? The crazed mutant named Hunter looked wildly from one of us to the other. The hospital doors opened. Tarzan, Eric, and Layla ran outside and finished surrounding Hunter.

"Who's this?" Tarzan asked panting.

"He's telepathic! He's the one responsible for Cat almost killing herself," Salem tattled. I grinned. Tarzan looked about ready to bite his head off.

"You're dead, little man," Eric warned. I shook my head as I tried to put all the pieces together.

"Wait, a second..." I said. Tarzan didn't listen. Instead he stepped forward and punched the little kid in the nose as hard as he could. My eyes widened. The crunch his nose made breaking sounded like someone stepping on a million potato chips. Hunter staggered backward clutching his nose.

He staggered right into Jason. Jason easily wrapped his arms behind his back and held him. Hunter struggled, but he wasn't nearly as strong as an Eraser.

"Hey, Big Freak. I'll hold him. Take another pot shot," Jason said to Tarzan.

"Gladly," Tarzan purred.

"Okay! Everyone, freeze!" I cried. My voice was echoing down the street. Finally I had everyone's attention. "Let him go."

"Cat, he tried to kill you," Tarzan said.

"Yeah," Eric agreed.

"We don't kill," I said. Jason rolled his eyes.

"Oh! Come on," the morally challenged Eraser whined. Hunter watched me I think out of curiosity than anything.

"This kid is crazy. I'll admit that. But I don't want to be a crazy homicidal maniac too," I said. They all looked at me like I was insane. "Just let him go, Jason."

"He'll be back to kill you," Layla pointed out.

"If he's got weird powers why doesn't he just kill me now with his mind-thingy?" I asked. I regretted the words the second they flew out of my mouth. We all turned to Hunter for an explanation. Blood ran down from his nose uncontrollably and dripped down his chin. He was still trying to catch his breath from the adrenaline.

"I haven't..." he said pausing for a breath. "...meditated for it." Oh, so he needed some mental preparation before he went strolling around in someone's head.

A siren came from the other end of the street. The fire trucks had finally come responding the panic we'd caused that triggered the fire alarm inside the hospital.

"We gotta go," Salem said. Jason turned Hunter around and held him up against the wall of the hospital.

"Give us one good reason not to kill you!" Jason ordered the bleeding assassin. Layla stood beside him agreeingly.

"I don't have one," Hunter said shamefully. "I have no reason to live anymore. I have no purpose anymore." Hunter turned to look at Salem. "The pride's turned on me. I've turned on you. You might as well do it. Go ahead and kill me."

"Sounds like a good enough reason to me," Layla said.

Jason rose his fist up in the air and slammed it on the top of the spotted boy's skull. He fell over in a heap.

"Jason!" I cried horrified.

"Don't worry. He's just knocked out. Layla and I will take him inside and turn him over to the authorities. Once they see what a freak he is they'll lock him up in Area 51 or dissect him or something," Jason said. We all stared at the unconscious assassin on the floor. None of us were comfortable with him alive. And even the Erasers weren't comfortable with him dead.

"Will he be able to find us again?" Tarzan asked stepping beside me.

"Jason and my job was to help him track you. We were the ones that led him to you before he betrayed us. He has to know your exact location to get into your head. You should be fine," Layla said.

"Cat, can we go now?" Kitten said holding my arm. Her big green eyes were enough to make the decision for us. You can't resist those suckers.

"Yes, sweetie," I told her. Jason slung Hunter's unconscious body over his shoulder. Layla followed him. She smirked a smug smirk and gave Eric a wink. We looked to Eric for a reaction and saw the corner of his mouth twitch in poorly hidden smile.

"What?" Eric said seeing all our staring faces.

"Let's just go home. Now that we know the Erasers know where we've been staying we really should get out of here," Tarzan said.

"Oh sure. _Now_ you take my advice," I said.

* * *

We had to get home fast. I can't believe they all left Taz by himself at the house! We walked in the front door of our...well, the house we were staying in. I could hear Taz crying before we even stepped inside. All five of us stared in shock. Taz stopped crying as soon as he saw us.

"Holy..." Luckily Tarzan didn't finish that sentence.

You know when you have a brand new puppy and you leave it home alone inside your house? Then you come back home and that puppy has eaten your shoe or chewed on the furniture? That puppy had _nothing_ on Taz. Couches were over turned. There was foam, fluff, and feathers from down comforters ALL over the house.

The kitchen table was missing a leg and there were Lucky Charms, Chef Boyardi, and other various food products all over the floor. Dressers were knocked over, glass from TV screens lied in ruins on the floor. I have one thing to say. I feel bad for the person house sitting for this family.

Taz was ecstatic to see us. He got up and ran right to my legs. I picked him up and held him.

"Whoa," Eric said observing the mess.

"I vote that we never leave Taz home alone EVER again," I said.

"Me too," Kitten said.

"Pack your bags. We're hitting the road again," I said. After we left a sorry note for the family and house sitter posing as a bunch of party addicted teenagers, we got out of that forsaken town faster than any car should travel.

* * *

::sigh:: There. There's more to come. Suggestions are helpful especially when I just finished a storyline and I'm not sure where to go next.

Thank you everyone who's been reading! Tune in next time (probably when I get home from work in about five hours) for another adventure!


	33. Click it or Ticket

I do not own Maximum Ride! I own all my wonderful experiments and whitecoat villian. Now for the next development which is still...well...developing I guess. I beckon inspiriation!

* * *

Being on the run again never felt so good. This time Salem decided to sit up front with Tarzan at the wheel. I sat in the back beside Taz's carseat. Kitten was on the other side. Eric sat in the middle seat with a Gameboy that he'd ripped off of the kids that had lived in the house that Taz had essentially destroyed. (Don't worry. We added that to the sorry note we left too.) 

We headed toward the sunrise aimlessly. It was better to drive along in semi silence. It gave us time to think of where to go. It was the question that always came up. Where to go?

"What do you think they'll do to that guy?" Kitten asked. "The other cat."

"The government will deal with them. He's their problem now. Maybe we'll get lucky and he'll tattle on the School," I shrugged. Sigh... Maybe in a perfect world. But we weren't lucky like that.

"Do you think the Erasers are still tracking us?"

"Probably," Tarzan said. "We're lucky the female warned us that they'd been following us. She must really like you, Eric." Eric went on playing his Gameboy. Then what Tarzan had said had registered through his distraction.

"Hey! She doesn't like me," Eric grumbled. Then there's that song that everybody knows.

"Eric and Layla sitting in a tree!" Salem (of course) started it.

"K-I-S-S-I-N-G," Kitten jumped in. I snickered under my breath.

"I don't like her!" Eric said. A red blushed flushed his striped cheeks.

"First comes love," Salem went on turning around in her seat to watch Eric grow more and more embarrassed. I should have stopped it, like a good parent would. But I couldn't help but enjoy the teasing like a big sister would.

"Then comes marraige!" Kitten continued. Eric swiped at her playfully. Kitten easily dodged.

"Oh please, if anyone's in love its not me," Eric said. He turned to me with a coy look upon his face. "Right, Cat?" All my pleasure in his embarrassment disappeared.

"What are you talking about?" I snapped.

"Cat's in love?" Kitten questioned. Tarzan looked in the rearview mirror. I met his gaze. Tarzan? No... That would be too weird. Much too weird. Way too weird. Beyond weird. Tarzan the big... cat guy? A guy with lion blood like me. The guy who was always taking punches and throwing himself at any Eraser that looked at me wrong? No. That's friendship. That's just loyalty.

Yup. Good ol' fashioned loyalty.

But Eric wasn't talking about Tarzan.

"She sure is," Eric said. He started to sing. "Cat and Jason, sitting in a tree." His words caught me by surprise like a sucker punch. I acted on my instincts. Exhaling deeply I leaned forward in my seat and smacked Eric as hard as I could right across the hood. My claws were unintentionally extended so I nearly got a claw stuck in the fabric in the process. Eric complained and grabbed his head.

"Ow! What?"

"That's not even funny!" I cried with red hot blood coursing through my veins. He looked back at me in shock. I let him go.

"Geez," Eric said.

"TARZAN WATCH THE ROAD!" Salem cried in genuine fear. We all looked out the wind shield. We were on the wrong side of the road with a semi coming head on! I couldn't contain my scream and neither could anyone else in the car. The truck honked its horn. Tarzan finally reacted and swerved us over to the right side of the road.

"Tarzan!" I cried.

"I'm sorry!" he said defensively.

"Pay attention. We're not in Europe. You drive on the right hand side of the road in America," Salem said.

"I said I'm sorry. I was distracted. Everybody okay?" Tarzan asked. Taz started to cry. I rocked his carseat glaring at Eric.

"Alright, that's enough," I said. "Changing the subject, where do we go next?"

"Internet cafe!" Salem said. I rolled my eyes.

"We're not going to stop just so you can mess around on the internet," I said tiredly.

"I have to check my email," Salem whined. I sighed and rubbed my temples leaning into my seat.

"What do you think, Tarzan?" I asked. Tarzan shrugged his massive shoulders. Familiar frustration was building up again. Running around aimlessly was tiring. It was like being shot at from far away. You never knew where or when to zig zag to dodge the bullet.

What a dark thought, I wondered privately. The kids ignored the important life deciding question.

"Okay," Salem said spinning around in her seat with a playful look on her face. She clicked off her seatbelt to face us. "Hypothetically, what would you do if you had a clone?"

" Put your seatbelt back on. We're not going to try to outrun the police without the help of a telepathic psycho," I said first. Then I thought about what a random question that was. What would I do with a clone?

"A clone? I don't know. I guess I would experiment different hairstyles on her to see which would look best on me." This earned stares from everyone in the car. "What? You wouldn't?" They went back to their various activities.

Salem leaned back in her seat and started to chew on her claw. It was a bad habit she was forming.

"Do you think we're here to save the world?" Salem asked thoughtfully.

"What's with the weird questions?" Tarzan asked.

"I don't know. I was just wondering," she said observing her fur covered hand. Then she sat up "But I really want to check my email!"

"Chill out, Sale. We'll get to a computer eventually," I said still slightly shaken and agitated with Eric.

"You guys want to hear a song?" Kitten asked. I patted her beanie covered head.

"Sure, kiddo," I said trying to shift gears into mother mode. She opened her mouth and sang. Well, more like belted.

"I KNOW A SONG THAT GETS ON EVERYBODY'S NERVES, EVERYBODY'S NERVES, EVERYBODY'S NERVES! I KNOW A SONG THAT GETS ON EVERYBODY'S NERVES AND THIS IS HOW IT GOES! I KNOW A SONG THAT GETS ON EVERYBODY'S NERVES..." she cried.

"Thank you, Kitten. That was nice," Tarzan said so patiently.

"But it's not done," Kitten said.

"Look, Kitten!" I said quickly pointing out the window. "Cows!"

"Where?" she said jumping at the window. I sighed and mimed wiping sweat off my forehead to our driver. Tarzan grinned in the rearview mirror. Eyes locked. We stared at one another.

"Tarzan, you're driving in the dirt on the side of the road," Salem alerted careful to keep her voice calm though her hand was wrapped around the handle on the roof of the car.

"Oh," Tarzan said quickly recovering. "Sorry."

See? My friend was so loyal it was distracting. There was no lovey dovey in this car.

* * *

Ah, what satisfying filler. Thank you my reviewers! If I knew who you were I would use my discount and get you all a tall carmel frappacino at Starbucks. Extra carmel. 


	34. The Evil Lives On

I do not own Maximum Ride! I do own my characters. Okay, here we go again. Another storyline for these characters. I'm not entirely sure where its going, but it just popped up in my head. So here we go.

* * *

"How can you get sick of Taco Bell?" Eric said to Salem. Salem folded her arms across her chest.

"How can you not?" she retorted. Eric put his Gameboy aside.

"Okay, Salem. We eat hamburgers everyday. And you get sick of tacos that we have like once a week?" Eric asked.

"At least we get hamburgers from different places," Salem said.

"Its still a hamburger," Eric said.

"If you two will stop arguing and if Eric swipes another debit card we can go to the next diner. Eric can get tacos. Salem can get a hamburger..." I said.

"I want a sundae," Kitten said.

"...And Kitten can get a sundae," I said. I turned to Tarzan. "Sound good?"

"Sounds perfect," Tarzan said. I was in the front seat now. Tarzan had refused to let anyone else drive so I stayed up there keeping him company and watching him carefully for any signs of him getting tired. Soon we hit a diner in a town in Idaho.

It was a quiet place. Truckers ate conversing with one another and occasionally bursting with laughter. We walked in and took a seat at a booth. As we sat down Eric whipped out the debit card.

"Alexis Shell," he read. "Sorry we took your debit card, Lexi." Tarzan looked through the blinds out the window. The girl known as Lexi drove away none the wiser that we had taken her card. Our waitress came to our table with a bright smile.

"Hi! My name is Sunshine. I'll be your server," she said. I looked at her name tag. Her name really was Sunshine. Wow. And I thought we had weird names. "What can I get you?"

We gave our order.

"Alright," Sunshine said jotting down the last of our order. "Say, you kids here for the fair?"

"No," I said politely. "We're just passing through." Now would you please leave us alone before you realize that one of us has stripes, one has a mane, one has a tail, and another has little kitty ears? I added silently.

"Oh," the waittress said. "Well, there's going to be rides, cotton candy, a pet fair, and whole bunch of other stuff at the Itex fair."

Poor Salem had been trying to sip her glass of water as she said this. And poor Eric had been sitting directly across from her when she spit it out all over him and started to cough. Tarzan and I looked at each other oddly. Kitten tried patting Salem's back as she finished coughing.

Sunshine tried not to look freaked out.

"I'll come back with your drinks," she said and left us quickly. Tarzan handed Eric a napkin.

"What's wrong?" I asked her.

"She just said Itex is holding a fair in this dinky little city!" Salem squealed, still shocked out of her mind.

"Sh! You don't have to scream, Sale," I hissed as truckers were turning around to see what the commotion was about.

"Itex is the School!" she said in a more controlled volume.

"What?"

"The company that runs the School is called Itex out here," Salem said. She scanned us all for our reactions.

"How do you know this?" Tarzan asked.

"Duh! Internet!" she said.

"We have to get out of here," I said going with my first instinct. I could see the wheels in Eric's head turning. He wiped off the remainder of the water that Salem had spit all over him.

"Convenient," Eric said. "The same town we're in. In the middle of Idaho?" I saw a flyer up by the cash register. I slid out of the booth and brought one back to the table.

"Maryland, Idaho Holds Big Event!" I read.

"Maryland welcomes the Itex company to our little town. Itex is hosting the Pet Fair where there will be rides, shows, and a pet fair with the animals from their personal no-kill shelter. Itex is celebrating its merge with drug and research company, Matron. The merge was hosted on a government grant seeing the good that these companies can do for our world combined. Director and future CEO, Sandra Kandi offered this quote, 'I grew up in a small town and I've always loved animals. That's one of the things that attracted me to Itex in the first place. Every quarter we donate a substantial profit to rescues, animal shelters, and animal right activists such as PETA. I could think of no more suitable to celebrate such a compatible union than hosting a pet fair."

I snorted with laughter.

"There are so many things wrong with that article," I said. Tarzan raised his hand and started to count the oddities.

He raised one finger. "Itex has their own animal shelters?"

"And torture chambers where they fuse kid's gene's with animals. But hey, at least they have no-kill animal shelters," Eric said sarcastically as he sipped his water.

"Itex contributes to PETA?" Tarzan said counting on his second finger.

"Makes sense," I pointed out. "PETA won't be investigating one of its biggest benefactors. But still very weird. Ironic even." Then suddenly Salem noticed something.

"Itex is merging with another company?" she said. She reached across the table for the town newspaper. I handed it to her. She lowered the paper. "I need to get to a computer before we go anywhere." She sounded so urgent that I finally gave.

I decided to take Salem to find a computer while Tarzan watched the others and let them eat. They promised to get what we ordered in to-go containers. This was an emergency and if Itex was in this town than they were probably watching us. Tarzan, Eric, Kitten, and Taz would hold our places and hopefully the attention of anyone who could be tracking us, while Salem and I figured things out.

Salem and I found out there was a library right across the street. (In this tiny town just about everything was on this street.) Salem darted for the nearest computer immediately.

All she had to do was put her hand on it and the search popped up.

Pages flipped from screen to screen with remarkable speed that only our Salem had the ability to sort through so quickly. Even at her speed it took almost twenty minutes to find whatever Salem was looking for. She scrolled down the page.

"That's weird. It took forever to find this company merge," she said.

"Why is that weird?" I asked her.

"The last time we were stuck in school I was watching this one whitecoat who kept checking his stocks on the wireless internet. I guess you get a lot of money from stocks. Well, I noticed company merges were a big deal. People with stocks want to know because merges can make your stock go waaaaay up. So there's all this information on it the merge advertising it so more people will buy more stocks," Salem said.

"In this case it took me forever to find this company merging," she said looking at me with her shining yellow eyes. I blinked. Okay, I decided. This twelve year old was a genius I came to this conclusion because I'm sixteen and I had no idea what she was talking about. "I have a lot of free time to look this stuff up on the internet in my head."

"Okay. So what does that mean?" I asked.

"It means either Itex or the other company don't want a lot of people to know about this merging. That's probably why they're announcing it in this tiny town. Not a lot of people are going to pay a lot of attention," she said.

"Why wouldn't they want people paying attention? Don't poor unsuspecting people have stock in Itex or something?" I said.

"Itex is not very popular," Salem said. She pulled up some articles from about a year ago. The headlines?

"_Itex Companies Around the World Destroyed By Kids_," I read aloud. "_After a popular website convinced children everywhere that the company was involved in inhumane practices. Children ranging from all ages all around the world formed posses and mobs demanding they stop unethical practices..._"

"They were found guilty. The government took them over. The official explanation released to the press was child labor and illegal animal testing," Salem explained. I felt my eyebrows go up. They found the experiments? Why didn't they find the School we were in? How did the world not know about the deformed kids? _Illegal animal testing?_

"They never mentioned the other mutants?" I asked.

"Nope," Salem said.

"So what happened to the ones that governments around the world found? Did they fix the kids at least?" Salem shrugged.

"It doesn't say," she said.

"Are they trying to hide all the mutants like us?" I asked astonished. Salem nodded.

"I guess so," she said.

"Why?" I said.

"Who knows?" Salem said. She pulled up another article about the people who were charged in the crimes of Itex. She looked at some information confused. She sat up in her computer chair and moved up to the screen as if maybe she were reading something wrong and she had to do a double take.

"Only three people were actually prosecuted," she said.

"Three?! Out of all the Itex's in the entire world!" I said shocked. Salem nodded.

"The other whitecoats testified that they had no idea what was really going on. Only the three directors did," Salem said.

"I'm sorry. Three people couldn't be the only ones involved with that many mutants," I said. I didn't even go to school (well, real school anyway) and I knew that!

"And get this. Itex is now under government jurisdiction. They never closed it down. They just took it over," Salem said. We looked at each other. Salem blinked. "I think the governments around the world are just continuing what Itex started."

* * *

I feel another evil plan emerging. Here comes my evil laugh... MWAHAHAHAHAHA! I have a new storyline. :-) 


	35. Golly Sandra

I do not own Maximum Ride! I own my characters.

* * *

Salem and I slid back into the diner and next to Tarzan and Kitten. Eric and Tarzan looked at one another and burst out laughing. Salem and I looked at one another and shrugged. Boys... 

"No, when you think it about it, it must be really horrible," Kitten said looking serious.

"What is?" Salem asked.

"Dr. Kandi's name is Sandra. Her name is Sandy Kandi," Kitten said. I smiled.

"No wonder she's evil," Eric giggled. "It's like her parents _wanted _her to be a stripper or a porn star." I gave Eric a look, but couldn't help smiling in my own immaturity. He looked away still snickering.

"I should look that up on the internet," Salem thought aloud.

"Please, don't," I said unable to stop myself from laughing a little bit. Salem rolled her eyes.

"No. Not to see if she's a porn star. But to get information to on her. We found out some weird stuff about Itex," Salem said. She repeated the information that she'd explained to me. How Itex had been destroyed and was coming back to life with this company merging, aided by the government. Once again our good mood disappeared with the bearing of bad news.

Man, we could never catch a break.

"How do you know all this?" Eric asked.

"Internet," Salem and I chorused. She slammed down on the table. "Oh! That reminds me. I better warn the Flock."

"The who?" I started to question. At that moment a happy family walked into the diner and walked up to the cash register. The crying baby in the mother's arms distracted our conversation.

"I want to get a doggie at the pet fair! No! A kitty!" the young daughter said jumping up and down beside her father.

"We'll see honey," the father said. "Four ice cream cones please. And could you please hurry? We're going to the fair."

"Certainly," Sunshine said. The fair was starting now. Itex was going to merge with Matron and who knew how many more kids that would bring suffering to.

"What are we going to do?" Eric asked.

"Is it really any of our business? Or should we ignore it?" Tarzan asked. That was an excellent question.

"Maybe its _our_ turn to save the world," Salem said from beside me.

* * *

We had to get into the car quickly (accidently forgetting Salem's and my to-go containers in the process) so that we could follow this family to the Itex Pet Fair. Tarzan tailed them expertly. Meanwhile the rest of us were quiet. The family rounded the corner to the fair and that's when we found out we probably didn't have to follow them.

The fair was so massive that we had completely missed it. The ferris wheel was bigger than any ferris wheel you've probably every seen. I you, because I haven't seen many, but you might have. This thing had two be almost three times the size of the one at Santa Monica Pier and had twice as many carriages swing on it.

"How did we miss this?" I asked everyone.

"Wow," Kitten said. "School has never been so tempting."

That in itself was creepy. It was just like they were trying to lure a bunch of kids in. The perfect bait for baby snatching and finding orphans like us.

"It's a company merging. It's a big deal. Maybe they just wanted to go big?" Salem offered. Eric shrugged. Who knew the reasoning behind these people who were so clearly THE SOURCE OF ALL EVIL! Anyway, Taz seemed to like it. He started screaming with delight when we pulled into the parking lot. I sighed. This was no place for any kid. I wished Tarzan and I could investigate this ourselves, but we were not separating ourselves from the kids again. Not after our last ordeal.

Everyone got out while I unstrapped Taz from the carseat, barely able to keep him from jumping out of my hands straight towards the fair.

"Yeah, yah, yah!" he screamed.

"Okay, okay. Chill out. We're going inside," I said. He jumped. "Whoa!" I caught him in midair. "Stop squirming little man!" Tarzan held out his arms. I handed Taz to him.

"Thanks," I said to him. Tarzan gave a nod.

"Okay guys. Try not to get separated. This is just like wandering around in the School and you would not want to be caught alone in the School," I said.

"Yes Mom," Eric teased. "I mean, ma'am." I scruffed up his hood.

"Okay, let's go," Tarzan said leading the way. When we paid for our tickets getting inside was easy. There were performers on a stage. A rodeo contest was being held somewhere else. There were at least fifteen rides. It was the grandest fair Idaho's probably ever had.

While I was looking on with disgust, I realized Tarzan was gone. My heart went wild.

"Where's Tarzan?" I said looking around.

"Right here," Tarzan answered from my other side. He approached with Taz in one hand and a corn-on-the-cob in the other.

"You bought Itex corn?" I questioned. Tarzan shrugged.

"That's evil corn," Kitten said innocently.

The crowd we were standing in suddenly erupted in applause. We all turned to face the stage. A man wearing an old fashioned mayor out (the one with the little top hat, coat-tailed jacket, and a sash across his chest) stood at the podium.

"Remember guys," I whispered. "Get ready for anything." Kitten reached for my hand and squeezed tight. My sixth sense was going crazy. I could sense the bad mojo in the air. I'm sure everyone else could too.

"It's great to have you all here," the mayor said. "I hope you'll stop by and look at the pets. They all need loving homes. Without further adu, I'll introduce you to Itex CEO, Dr. Sandra Kandi." Everyone clapped respectively. Almost everyone. The pride didn't even blink with recognition.

Dr. Kandi walked out with her blonde hair pulled back in a stylish pony tail. Her glasses were sensible and her business suit encentuated every perfect curve. If I didn't hate her already, I would hate her for being so freakin' pretty. Self consciously I looked at Tarzan, then everyone else to make sure they were paying attention.

"Thank you Mayor Tisdell," Dr. Kandi said and gave him a quick dry peck on the cheek.

Slut. She probably was a porn star, I thought venomously.

"Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls," she said with that wicked smile.

"Cat," Kitten tugged my arm. I looked down at her. "Look at all the police." I looked around and that's when I noticed that there sure was a lot of police around. I looked to Salem.

"The government," she said. She leaned toward Eric and informed him who informed Tarzan beside him quietly.

Dr. Kandi went on. "Itex's hardship was a catastrophe. No one expected what would happen. A silly fictional blog turned into a devestating world wide epidemic effecting children everywhere. If people have learned anything from the Itex Riots last year, I hope it is that parents should watch what their children are doing online more carefully," she started. Salem glared and folded her arms across her chest. "I hope the children who broke the law learned their lesson." I swear her eyes fell on us. She smiled the slightest smile that could only be noticed with cat eyes.

The adult men and women clapped.

"Suck up," Eric whispered. I smiled.

"Matron and Itex is a union that we've all been waiting for. The drug and research companies need all the help we can get and we have plenty of experienced biologists to offer their assisstance. Plus it will be a huge financial opportunity give us the chances we need to offer bigger donations to charities such as pet fairs and other animal friendly organizations!"

The crowd erupted in applause. She had the people wrapped around her pretty, slutty finger.

"So now that Matron and Itex has officially merged, I give you our new company...," she stepped aside and the people on the sides of the stage pulled the ropes tied to an Itex banner. A new banner dropped over it with the new company name. "Itron!"

Balloons flew up in the air, confetti fell to the ground. The band started to play and Dr. Kandi led the applause from the podium. She leaned into the microphone one last time. "Thank you folks! Enjoy your evening and remember to stop by the pets!"

"This is disgusting!" Tarzan shouted over the noise of the band. I nodded in agreement. "It doesn't look like they're doing anything here. Maybe this fair's just making a statement?"

"I want to go on the ferris wheel!" Kitten said tugging on Tarzan's eyes.

"Kitten, we really should-" Tarzan was cut short by Kitten's making her eyes big glassy green orbs that could convince someone to take a bullet for her. Tarzan sighed and rolled his eyes. I shook my head.

"I'll be right back," Tarzan said tiredly. "I'm taking Kitten on the ferris wheel. I'll take Taz with me."

"Dah!" Taz agreed jumping up and down in his arms excitedly.

"You want to trap yourself in a box and dangle a hundred feet in the air?" I asked Kitten astonishedly.

"Yeah! You wanna come?" she asked. I rolled my eyes.

"No thanks, kiddo. Salem, Eric and I will go check out the pets. Maybe we'll find something weird there," I said.

"If you find a talking dog buy it for me!" Kitten said taking Tarzan's hand and running off in the other direction. I looked at Salem and Eric. We all shrugged.

"Okay. Let's go check out the pets," I said leading the way. Even though everything seemed normal, aside from the fact that this was probably the most giant fair in the world in the middle of nowhere, I couldn't get rid of that bad mojo feeling.

* * *

Is it weird that now I really want to go to a fair?

Thank you my awesome reviewers! Spread the love! Knowledge is power and all that jazz...


	36. An Unfair Disaster

I do not own Maximum Ride! I do own make characters, but only half of Itron since I wasn't the one who created Itex.

WARNING! POV'S MAY CHANGE! Again...

* * *

We walked from cage to cage seeing different cute little animals in each cages. We say kittens, puppies, iguanas, birds. All attached with their own crazy personal story about how they came to the shelter. Itex, I mean, Itron was pulling out all the stops to convince people that they were just another generous organization. 

I walked over to Salem who was looking at a little Scottish terrier. She probably didn't know I was behind her, because she started talking to the dog.

"Hi," she said to the dog. "Can you talk, little guy?"

I cocked an eyebrow, but watched to see if she was up to something. Salem was strange kid. She could be talking about stocks and company merges with expertise that no twelve year old should possess. The next minute she's talking to dogs expecting them to talk back.

"Is your name Total?" she whispered. The dog cocked his head and whined.

"Just bark once for yes," Salem begged. The dog growled. I guess that was a no. Salem sighed and jumped as she backed right into me.

"Oh! Hi," she said.

"Hi," I said back to her. Eric joined us with a great big smile on his face.

"What's with you?" I asked. Eric shrugged not so innocently.

"Oh, nothing," he said. Then suddenly about thirty dogs ran right behind them howling and knocking over trash cans on the ground. People ran out of the way grabbing their children and dropping their belongings. That Eric was a sneaky little guy. My brow furrowed.

"You set a bunch of dogs free?" I said.

"I'm not going to leave them here with Itex... I mean, Itron. Is it just me or does Itron sound like a Transformer's name?" he asked.

"I wouldn't know," I said giving him a what-the-hell-are-you-talking-about look.

A sound made me, Salem, and Eric turn in the same direction. It was the sound of metal creaking. It was faint. But it was there. Only our sensitive ears could have made out the noise.

"Don't worry," Eric said. "Carnival rides aren't exactly the best oiled machines out there."

"Okay," I said accepting his answer.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

Hey guys. Tarzan here. I'll be taking over because...Well, you'll see. I'm a big guy. I don't blend in well in a crowd. So people can't help but look at me oddly as I lead an ecstatic eight year old with one hand and I'm holding a baby in the other.

"Wow!" Taz cried.

Hm, he said a new word, I thought blandly to myself. I'd have to tell Cat. With Lexi's debit card we bought tickets. I handed the debit card. The ticket guy shook his head.

"Kids are free. Courtesy of Itron," he said. The kids around us cheered. When we got in line there were a few couples, but mostly estatic kids like Kitten.

"This is going to be fun," Kitten said assured.

"I don't know," I said. "I'm kind of against being locked up in metal crates." Kitten started to make her eyes big and watery again. In case I was changing my mind. "Don't worry, Kit. I'll still go on. But I won't like it." Kitten stood in front of me completely excited. Every muscle was tensed like she was doing everything she could to keep from jumping out of her skin in a fit of joy.

How can you blame her. None of us had real childhoods.

The worker guy opened the crate for us and let us in. We sat down and I placed Taz on the seat beside me. He toddled up to the cage and pointed to something.

"Dah!" he shouted. Kitten looked in the direction he was pointing.

"Look! I can see Cat, Eric, and Salem!" Kitten said. I nodded along with her as our carraige started to make its way to the top. It was a long way up. I was starting to feel anxious. That's when we all heard it. The metal creaked and groaned loudly. Kitten turned toward me.

I tried to keep my head up high. Had to be a good leader.

"What was that?" Kitten asked. Then the carraige jolted. My heart sank. I had this terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that was almost always right. The same feeling I got the second Cat said good bye to me with the intention to go kill herself.

"Uh oh," Taz said. Apparently, I wasn't the only one with that feeling. But when two kids look at you with that worried look on their faces. The same ones you'd seen on every mutant in the School you grew up in, you can't help but feel the need to change that look.

"It's probably noth-" There was a very distinct _ting_ sound that grabbed my attention. I looked out the little bars and saw a pin falling to the ground. "Damn it!" I cried, scaring the kids in the process. Cat would get mad at me for cussing in front of the kids, but I felt it was appropriate. I grabbed Taz and Kitten pulling them close.

"Hold on to something," I said following my gut.

"Why?" Kitten asked shakily. Then the carriage jolted. The metal groaned and then suddenly we were spinning much, much faster.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

The final snap was what made me turn around. The ferris wheel fell off its supports onto the ground. The kids inside started to scream. People watched horrifically as the ferris wheel teetered a moment and then started spin much like a wheel is supposed to on the ground. It was moving wildly across the fair, crushing hot dog stands, probably some innocent people, and game booths.

"Tarzan!" I gasped. "Tarzan, Kitten, and Taz might have been in there!" Salem and Eric didn't try to stop my hysterics as I fell on all fours to get better speed. If people were in my way, I didn't hesitate to phase right through them (careful of my untransparent left foot). Salem and Eric were following me as fast as they could, but neither of them could run as fast as me.

I made my way easily to the front of the crowd that was surrounding the wreckage. What I saw horrified me. Each swinging carraige was on fire. I covered my mouth in shock as the police watching the whole thing barked orders. Fire trucks swung around the entrance of the fair.

People screamed. And my sensitive ears could hear everyone. Even the policeman who was getting a closer look at the disaster.

"Oh God," said the man. "No one's coming out of this alive." And no matter how many panicked voices I heard, I could not hear Tarzan, Kitten, or Taz.

* * *

Don't worry guys. Remember, I always have a plan.


	37. Parlezvous le français ?

I do not own Maximum Ride. I do own my characters. Sorry for leaving you all hanging for a while. I'll fix that.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

Even now I'm not entirely sure what happened. I remember hearing things and being moved. People were shouting about kids and there were vans moving around. Kitten was unconscious when I looked at her. I thought she might even be dead when I saw the blood going down her forehead. And Taz was ripped away from my hands.

I heard many people talking really fast and running around like. Like a pit crew at Nascar. They ran to each carraige with drills and yelling at one another if someone was dead or alive. Then they would put the carraige on fire.

That's about all I remember from the fair.

The first time I really woke up with a clear head I found myself some dark and damp. My head felt like it had been split open like one of those aliens from Independence Day and then stapled back shut. I groaned out loud and heard my voice echo around me.

"Hello?" I said into the darkness.

"Tarzan!" Kitten's voice responded from nowhere and everywhere at once. I clenched my eyes shut. Her shrill little girl voice wasn't the best for my headache right now.

"Hey, Kit," I said trying to sound as enthusiastic as possible. "Where are you?"

"Right next to you," Kitten said.

"Where?"

"Right next to you," Kitten said again. I felt her hand close around mine. I looked in her direction and could barely make the outline of her face. I sighed. "I know. It's really dark in here."

"Where's Taz?" I asked. Kitten didn't answer. "Kitten, where's Taz?"

"I don't know," she said in almost a whisper. My eyes were starting to adjust to the darkness. Our damp cell had about three inches of water on the ground. The walls were brick, reinforced with a steel frame. I know. I tried to knock it down and now my head and my fists hurt.

Kitten and I were alone. At least we thought we were. Our eyes still weren't the best in the dark.

"Where are we?" Kitten asked.

"The smart money says we're at School or Itron or whatever they're calling it now," I grumbled.

"Smart money?" Kitten asked.

"It's just a phrase," I said.

"Oh," she said. There was a moment of silence. I had a bad feeling in my gut. And just like that we heard a sound. A similar sound to the metal groaning right before the ferris wheel went spinning into disaster.

"What was that?" Kitten asked. The metal clinked louder. "That's the sound of someone unlocking a door!" Kitten stood up and ran toward the sound. I followed behind her with my arms out, feeling for any walls I might run into.

"I found something! I think it might be a door handle," she groaned and pulled. "It's too heavy! I can't open it." It took my a while to find her. Once I did I found the handle. I pulled on it and what was nearly impossible for Kitten was easier than opening a pickle jar for me.

The door creaked even louder on its rusty hinges. I cringed and held my throbbing head.

"Wow," Kitten said looking up at me. "That was easy."

"Very," I agreed suspiciously. We walked out into the tell tale blank white hallway that was signature Itron feng shui. The nearest door was on the left. Kitten and I could both hear voices coming from inside. She looked up at me questioningly. I put my finger to my lips gesturing her to be quiet as we eavesdropped in mid conversation.

"-recording their every move. We find that it is most productive when we give real life tests where the subject is not aware that it even is a test, but a real life challenge..." said a woman. I poked my head in the room. There was Dr. Kandi and two other men looking out a glass window onto the floor below. Dr. Kandi turned around and flashed her cheerleader smile at me. One of the men started to talk in a different language to the other man.

My heart sped up as she saw me.

"Don't be shy, Tarzan. We were waiting for you to get up," Dr. Kandi said. "Is Kitten with you?" Kitten stepped out from behind me and stood next to me.

"Good," she said. The two other whitecoats turned around. One was a short fat man. The other was a dark haired man with bright blue eyes. He had an award winning smile that was a spot of match to Dr. Kandi.

"_Bonjour_," said the man.

"Say hello to Dr. Lareaux," Dr. Kandi said. That's when something surprising happened. Kitten opened her mouth.

"_Allez au diable_," Kitten said with venom in her tone. I shot her a look. Kitten ignored me, locked in a competitive staring contest with the whitecoats. Dr. Lareaux raised his eyebrows.

"_Vous parlez le français_?" Dr. Lareaux said. Kitten cocked her head to the side and gave her one of Cat's trademark fake smiles.

"_No. Évidemment non_," she said. Whatever she said, it sounded sarcastic. Dr. Kandi looked at me with confusion. I shrugged.

"Don't look at me. We didn't teach her French," I said. Dr. Kandi took this new information extremely well.

"And she's a universal translator," Dr. Kandi said to the short whitecoat accompanying her. The short man translated this into French for Dr. Lareaux. Dr. Lareaux nodded.

"_Je les prendrai_," Dr. Lareaux said to the translator. The whitecoat smiled and looked to Dr. Kandi.

"He says it's a deal," said the man.

"What's a deal?" I asked Dr. Kandi. I walked up to her making myself as intimidating as possible. When she didn't even flinch I knew I had to show her I meant business. I grabbed her by the throat and threw her gently against a wall (regular humans weren't as tough as the Erasers I usually threw into walls.)

The moment I did this I felt a charge of electricity go right through me to my very core. The pain was excruciating. I let go of her and fell to my knees. The pain wouldn't stop though. My world was fading to white. I could barely hear Kitten screaming over my own screams.

"Stop!" she cried desperately. "_Arrêter_!" The pain came to a sudden and complete stop. I turned around and saw that the translating whitecoat had a cattle prod aimed at me. I held up my hands to show that I was done harrassing Dr. Kandi. Dr. Lareaux shook his head disappointedly. He reached into his coat and took out a metal collar from inside his coat.

"_Je n'ai pas voulu le faire_," he sighed.

"Yeah, well you don't have to," Kitten said to him. He leaned forward and snapped the collar around my neck. "Where's Taz?" The collar shifted against my skin. It was warm and buzzed gently against my skin with warning. I could sense the electricity coursing through it.

"Taz, the baby Eraser?" Dr. Kandi asked.

"No, Taz the cartoon character," Kitten said sarcastically. "Who do you think I was talking about?" I started to smile, until Dr. Lareaux tugged her toward him and snapped a collar around her neck too.

"Hey! Don't touch her!" I growled. Another shock flooded my system and once again I was cringing on the floor.

"Don't worry about Taz. He didn't belong with your little pride anyway. He was a mistake. Jason and Layla will take good care of him," Dr. Kandi said. "Now our little transaction has been made. Run along with Dr. Lareaux."

"_Advancer_," Dr. Lareaux said motioning us to come with him. There was that bad feeling again. With no other choice left, Kitten and I followed Dr. Lareaux. As we walked through the hallways I saw brand new prisons. Kids had shirts on that said Itron across the front. I recognized them immediately.

These kids were in the ferris wheel from the fair. The whole ride had been a trap to get more kids! Parents would think they were dead and Itron would get free kids to do more experiments on. Most of them were still unconscious or barely waking up. The trap hadn't only worked on them, it worked on us too.

Kitten stopped to stare at them. The whitecoats escorting us bumped into her and pushed her to keep walking. She reluctantly kept moving.

Dr. Lareaux stopped and shook the hands of the whitecoats as soon as we were outside. I leaned over to Kitten.

"What is he saying to them?" I whispered.

"Dr. Lareaux is saying that he will pay one million dollars for you, and one for me. He says the French government thanks them," he said

"Salem was right. The government is involved," I realized out loud.

Dr. Lareaux said his farewells and took us to the goverment regulated cars where we sat in the backseat and watched the world go by the window. Kitten was silent, crying a little, but just like Cat she was too proud to show it. So I put a comforting arm around her and smiled at her when she looked at me to let her know it was alright.

Sometimes a leader has to lie. Its just the only way to make your troops keep marching on.

* * *

Viva la France!

My reviewers are awesome!


	38. Never Piss Off A Kitty

I do not own Maximum Ride! I do own my characters.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

Neither Salem or Eric talked to me for at least three days. There were no survivors from the ferris wheel accident. We didn't leave Maryland, Idaho about a week. And while we were there we attended the trial. Itron (and the state of Idaho) vs. Otto Rides (the company that made the ferris wheel.) Itron won easily. But I couldn't help but sit on the bench and stare at each family member that went on the stand and started crying about their children on the ferris wheel during the accident.

We knew better. Itron didn't do anything on accident when they were Itex, and I bet they wouldn't make anymore accidents now. The only thing mistake they made was killing three members of my pride. Because that was a big, **_BIG_** mistake.

Eric and Salem were solemn and quiet. Occasionally Salem would break out into tears and have to leave the courtroom. Eric just stared. And me? I just stared and cried at the same time. That's why I stole these sunglasses I found. I can't be the leader that was crying all the time. Even though I was.

Everyone was compensated a ridiculous amount of money. Dr. Kandi sent her personal condolences to every family. That wasn't good enough.

I wanted Tarzan, Taz, and Kitten back. Or I wanted revenge.

As the courtroom emptied, Salem, Eric, and I were alone sitting on the hardwood benches as they brought up the next case. We sat in the very back and watched uninterested in whatever case this was. Something about fraud and parking tickets, I don't know. I wasn't really paying attention.

"What do we do now?" Eric asked. Salem broke down in tears again. I tried desperately to think of an answer. But the only thing that kept coming to mind is...

"We have to kill Dr. Kandi," I answered as soon as the thought entered my brain. Salem stopped sobbing and stared at me like Eric beside her.

"Cat..." Eric said putting his hand on my knee. "Relax. I mean, Itron is always messing with us. Maybe they're just trying to separate us? Maybe this is a test?"

"Then its a test that's going to get them all killed," I responded.

"I can't believe they're..." Salem said wiping her fur covered face with her sleeve. "They've got to be alive." Her optimism made my heart leap. It reminded me of Kitten's bright outlook on life. How she could think the best things about even the worst people.

"And there's only one way to find. We have to find Dr. Kandi," Eric said.

"How do we do that?" Salem asked. I stared at the front of the courtroom. The judge went on talking, but I couldn't hear what he was saying. I thought for a moment.

"Layla said she and Jason were tracking us. You think they're still following us?" I asked.

"Probably. Otherwise it was a one in a million coincidence that this little town just happened to be holding the Itron fair that we just happened to be passing through," Eric said. I smiled at my idea.

"Good," I thought with an evil smirk. "I know what to do." And for once I wasn't lying.

* * *

"Crap!"

"There he goes again!" Layla shouted running after the little monster that was the baby Eraser. Taz ran for the van door and started to scream and pound on it. Jason ran up to him and picked him up. Or at least tried to. Taz opened his snout and bit into the door.

"Geez!" Jason said finally prying him off. Taz snickered in his gravely Eraser voice as he'd taken a good chunk of the door with him.

"Here you go, Mom," Jason said dropping Taz in Layla's lap. Layla held the baby up to her face awkwardly and cringed.

"I am not this thing's mother," she growled. Jason got to the driver's seat and put the car in drive. Layla rolled her eyes and took the struggling Taz with her to the passenger seat. "What was Kandi thinking giving this kid to us?"

"Who knows," Jason muttered. "If you ask me, that woman isn't quite right up here." Jason said pointing to his head.

"Maybe. But the least she could do is give us some Adderall or something," Layla said. Taz was tired of fighting. He panted and finally relaxed in Layla's lap.

"Where does it look like they're going?" Layla asked.

"They're still going east," he said. "I guess they're done mourning." Layla shook her head.

"You know, that was low. Even for the whitecoats," Layla said.

"We don't question the boss lady unless you want a death date to appear on the back of your neck," Jason said. Layla cringed and rubbed her neck self consciously.

"They're pulling over in the next town," Jason reported.

"That was fast," Layla commented. Her stomach growled loudly. She groaned. "Maybe they're stopping for food. We should stop for food."

"Sounds good to me," Layla said.

"_CAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT_!" Taz suddenly shrieked. Jason and Layla both covered their ears simultaneously.

"Ugh!" Layla said swinging her head around to face Jason. "That's it! We're telling Kandi we can't watch this freaky kid!"

"What?" Jason asked unable to hear his partner over Taz's shrill cry.

"I SAID, WE'RE TELLING KANDI WE CAN'T WATCH THIS KID!" Layla shouted.

"DEFINITELY," Jason agreed over Taz's ridiculously loud crying.

Layla saw something glowing out of the corner of her eye. She pointed to Jason's pocket.

"Your phone is ringing," she said.

"WHAT?"

"YOUR PHONE IS RINGING!" she repeated. She covered Taz's mouth as Jason reached for his phone.

"Hello?"

"The packages are delivered. Meet up with the pack in the next town. They'll be waiting for you," Dr. Kandi said.

"Yes, ma'am," he said obediently. He hung up the phone. "No more tailing the kitties. We're going home." Layla sighed.

"Finally," she said. Jason drove the car up the next off ramp to the designated area. Layla forgot her hand was still covering Taz's mouth. The baby Eraser opened his mouth and chomped down. Layla screamed.

"OW! SON OF A-!"

* * *

He he he... 

Thanks to all my great reviewers! You guys rock!!!


	39. Familiar Mutants

I do not own Maximum Ride! But I do own my characters!

Before I go on I have to say that this chapter was brought on by popular demand by reviewers. Well, sort of. It's more of a clone of what was popularly demanded by reviewers.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

I thought that when Dr. Lareaux took us on the plane he was going to do horrible whitecoat things to us. I thought he was going to shove us in reinforced dog crates or put us to sleep in the cargo. But no. It was first class all the way. Maybe the French aren't as bad as people making fun of them always said they were.

Then again, we hadn't been there too long.

"Hey Kitten," I said. Kitten took off her head phones that were unnecessarily placed on her head, _over _her actual cat ears.

"Yeah?"

"Why didn't you tell us you could speak other languages?" I asked her. Kitten laughed.

"Other languages? I can speak all languages," she said.

"Since when?" I asked.

"Since Cat and Eric first taught us English," she said with a shrug. "I thought everyone could do that. I thought people just spoke whatever language they felt like." I furrowed my brow at her in confusion. She ignored me and continued watching the movie that I wasn't paying attention to.

Huh... Well, what do you know.

"Tarzan?" Kitten asked getting my attention once more. "When do you think we'll get back to Cat and the others. Will they come back to rescue us?" Her eyes were getting big and watery again. Gah! Those stupid cute eyes! I looked away pretending to grab a magazine in front of me.

The truth was that Cat probably thought we were all dead. I took a moment to wonder how she had taken the news.

"I'm sure she's doing whatever she can to get to us," I lied. "And Taz too." Kitten smiled.

"I thought so," she said and placed the ear phones on her head.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

"Alright gang," I said shifting the sunglasses on my face since I was still a mess. "I'm going into that shop there to lift some supplies. Eric, you're the best at stealing. Did you see the van drive in?"

"The one with all the Erasers in it?" Eric asked nonchalantly. I nodded.

"Yup. Steal a phone. Salem, do you think you can mess with some electrical stuff on the phone and tap into their frequency?" I asked. Salem looked at me like I'd just given her instructions in Italian. I sighed patiently. "Do you think you can fiddle around with it until we can get some information about where they're going?"

"Sure. Shouldn't be too hard," Salem shrugged.

"Good. Distract the Erasers by doing something stupid. They think we don't know they're here so they'll be busy trying to figure out what your doing while still trying to lie low," I said. "Got it?"

Eric and Salem all nodded.

"Remember. This is for Taz, Tarzan, and Kitten. So don't screw up," I said. I guess it was kind of harsh by the look on both their faces. I didn't care. I was still pissed. I walked into the gun shop and tried not to look to suspicious as the gun salesman was talking to some kid and his father about hunting. I walked to the back of the store and took a look at the merchandise in the clear cabinets.

There were pistol magnums and what nots. I don't know. I don't really know what all this gun lingo was. I just tried to pick up the matching shells that went along with it. I made my hand transparent and then pulled out what I needed. As quickly as I had come in I was gone in just enough time to hear Salem set off about thirty car alarms at once.

I smirked to myself as I headed back to the car. Revenge would be sweet if my pride was half dead.

One time Tarzan and Eric made us all watch Die Hard in the first house we lived in together. In the immortal words of John McClane (though its probably spelled wrong), Yippee ky ay.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

We reached France with little tubulance. Of course there was plenty of security all around us as soon as we got off. Kitten looked around viewing every little detail about France. She seemed fascinated and terrified at the same time. She held her arms across her chest careful to keep her distance. With the collars still around our next we were careful to comply to what they wanted.

I put my arm across her shoulder and held her close. She was slightly more comforted. The men that surrounded us were either wearing black suits or white lab coats. The ones in black suits had their fingers in their ears and were talking to one another through microphones in their sleeves that apparently they thought no one would notice.

"Hey, Kit. You know you gotta start teaching me French," I said trying to strike up a casual conversation to help her feel more relaxed. Kitten smiled weakly. If I was helping her at all, it wasn't much.

Within an hour we were at a new Itron. A brand new School. I wrang the collar around my neck uncomfortably. I bet if Salem were here she could difuse it easy. She was good with electrical stuff. Hell, maybe she was tracking right now with the internet. Can you do that on the internet? I wouldn't know. I've never even attempted to use a computer before.

"_Avancer. Suivez-moi_," said Dr. Lareaux. I followed Kitten's lead and followed the man inside. The Itron wasn't like the one in America. It wasn't in the middle of nowhere. I was right on the outskirts of Paris.

"This isn't like I thought my first trip to Europe would be," Kitten said as they led us down the halls. "I thought we'd be able to see the sights and eat fancy foods just like the Flock did."

"The Flock?" I echoed. She looked at me and nodded.

"Yup. Salem told me all about them. They have a talking dog. They were the people who took out the School the first time. They were the ones that started all those riots," she said. I thought for a moment.

"Who are they?" I asked privately hoping none of the French dudes around us didn't know English.

"Mutants like us, only instead of cats they're birds," Kitten said with a shrug. I nodded slowly.

"Oh..." I said. Interesting.

"We should read their blog on the internet. That's how Salem keeps up with what's going on," Kitten said. I thought about this new information.

"Yeah," I said. "I guess we should." We entered what looked like an auditorium. There was one other kid in there. He was a small black haired boy sitting in one of the fold out chairs facing the front. He was still in the dimly lit room and sat cross legged on his seat.

"_Asseoir_," instructed the white coat.

"Let's go sit down," Kitten said leading me along. I followed her and the second we sat down the show started.

Dr. Lareaux went up to the podium and cleared his throat.

"_Mon assistant fidèle traduira_," he said.

"He's getting a translator," Kitten explained. She leaned forward in her seat looking bored. She leaned her elbow on her knee and then rested her chin in her hand. "Good. I didn't want to have to repeat every word he said for you later."

A kid around fourteen years old walked onto the stage. He was a tall guy with sunglasses and he wore a gray jumpsuit. I noticed this one didn't have to wear a collar. Lucky bastard...

"Good morning," said the kid. He unfolded his tense wings from behind his back and let them hang comfortably. Two other kids joined him from across the stage. Another fourteen year old and an eight year old. "My name is Iggy, this is Fang and Gasman."

Kitten gasped audibly. I looked around trying to find out what had made her freeze up the way she did. It didn't take a lot to shock us, but Kitten was staring dumbly at the stage. Maybe all the white coat's eyes fell out of their heads at once? That would shock me.

Nope. All the white coats were perfectly in tact. Damn wishful thinking...

"We going to be training you three to work in top security spy missions for the government of France," Fang said joining the other bird-kid. Wait a second... Bird-kid?

"But first there's something Dr. Lareaux would like to say something," Gasman said. As the french guy went on Kitten could not keep herself from staring at all three of them with her eyes bugged out and her mouth hanging open. I think I was beginning to understand why.

* * *

BEFORE ANYONE FREAKS OUT...Remember I always have a plan! I will update immediately because I know it sucks to leave you right here. Give me like an hour to pump out another chapter. 

Thanks for reading you guys! I've been getting the BEST feedback I've ever seen with this story.


	40. He liiiiiiives!

I do not own Maximum Ride!

But I do own my characters!

He he he! I feel so deliciously eeeevil with that last cliffhanger! But alas, I'm not that evil so I will go ahead and elaborate on the previous bomb shell. And maybe give you another.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

"_Hé_! _Attendez une seconde_!" Kitten shouted standing up in her seat. I grabbed the back of her shirt as she was so excited she nearly launched herself in the air with one of her crazy high jumps onto the stage.

"Kitten, calm down," I ordered sternly. Innocent little Kitten turned at me and growled. I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

"Yes," said the other boy watching this show. He had a strange calm about him as he sat there staring at the bird-kids without even giving us a side glance. "There is nothing to get excited about." I'll admit, I should have gotten a better look at him earlier.

"_Rien pour être excité de ? C'est le Troupeau! Ils travaillent pour Itron!_" Kitten went on pointing accusingly at the bird-kids on the stage. All three of them stared back unphased by whatever it was she was saying in french.

"Kitten! Speak English!" I said spinning her around and forcing her to face me. When I saw her face I saw that there were streams coming down from her eyes. She wiped her eyes and looked away. "Kitten, don't cry in front of them," I whispered. She sniffed.

"It's the Flock. These guys are supposed to be good guys," Kitten said. Her lip quivered but she forced it steady. "These are the ones who inspired Cat to save us all. They were... awesome. They were Salem and my heroes. She used to tell me stories about how great they were. They can't be bad guys!" she whispered with a sense of urgency in her voice.

"Don't worry," said the cross-legged boy who was also being forced to listen to Dr. Lareaux and the Flock's speech. Kitten and I looked at the boy for the first time. He wore a gray jumpsuit like each other flock members standing on the stage, but he had an electrified collar like we did. He was staring forward with plain brown eyes. His face was pale with a slight yellow tint. His skin was spotted with familiar black markings.

My heart stopped.

"They're just clones," Hunter said reassuringly. "The real birdies are still out and about." Kitten and I stared at him. He turned his head and stared back at us.

"Funny running into you two here," he said with a smirk.

* * *

Jason and Layla were packed into the back an humvee filled with about six other Erasers. They were fully formed, orders of Dr. Kandi. Jason and Layla weren't. They had enough on their hands already without adding lack of space to move around in. 

"DAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Taz cried from Layla's lap. She held onto him harder as he struggled.

"Can you keep that midget quiet?" another Eraser who went by Muzz asked rudely. Jason narrowed his eyes. Jason was the alpha of the Erasers if there ever was one. He picked up Taz and put him in his lap instead. Muzz looked away.

Layla clenched her jaw angrily.

"I can't believe Kandi's still making us watch him," she growled.

"Think of it this way. It'll be good practice for when you and the tiger-boy have cubs," Jason laughed. Layla took a deep frustrated breath and then looked out the window. It was strange not tailing the pride anymore. Not listening for tips of where they were through the white coats. Seeing the back of their current stolen vehicle from the road.

She turned around to look out the back window of where they'd come.

She couldn't believe what she saw. The pride, or what was left of them, were tail gating them. Only now, they were in a much larger car. A Hummer to be exact. She had eye contact with Cat whose eyes were shielded by dark inpenetrable sunglasses.

Eric was beside her in the front seat and Salem was in the middle row between both of those seats. Cat smiled wryly and waved, wiggling her fingers in mock greeting. Layla quickly covered Taz with her body. The pride couldn't know he was alive.

"Guys," Layla started to warn the other Erasers.

They turned around one by one.

"How did they...?" Suddenly theHummer slammed into the back of the van.

"Go! Go!" Jason shouted to the driver.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

"Punch it!" I said to Salem, which was oddly ironic since I was driving. But my plan needed Salem. Salem put her hand on the dashboard simultaneously with my foot slamming down on the gas all the way to the floor. She gave it an extra energy boost.

The Hummer jolted forward and crunched right into the back of the van. Our Hummer took a lot less damage than their dinky little van.

I started to slow down.

"Okay, Eric, you're on," I said. He took the pistol and cocked it. "You sure you can do this?"

"Nope," Eric said closing one eye and aiming.

"That's cool. Do it anyways!" I ordered. The shot rang out through windshield. The glass shatted blocking my vision. "Kick it out! I can't see!" I told Salem. She did as she was told and the windshield tinkled onto our hood.

The van was weaving through traffic trying desperately to get away. Oh no you don't, I thought trailing them easily. Through the glass I could see heads bobbing over the seats. Jason screaming out orders and other Erasers screaming at their comrades in the confusion. They hadn't counted on _us _hunting _them._ Seeing the Erasers scatter within the car was almost sweet enough to satisfy my taste for revenge. Almost...

"You missed! Take another shot!" I instructed Eric even though my poor sensitive ears were still ringing. He did. Another miss. He tried again and missed again.

"Come on, Eric!" Salem screamed.

"I'm trying!" he shouted back at her. That shot made it. It blew out their tire. The van wove on three wheels and then started to lose balance. It toppled on one side and skid off the road into the ditch. I smiled and nodded to Eric. He reached for the extra bullets I'd stolen and started to reload.

"Perfect job, guys," I said pulling over. I put the car in park on the side of the road and started to get out.

"Cat!" Salem said. She reached out and grabbed my arm before I could go any further. I looked around and gave our surroundings a quick once over to see if there were any cops or people who'd seen us. Everything was clear. "Don't you think this is a little...?"

"A little what?" I said slightly agitated that she was questioning my authority.

"Crazy?" Eric said.

I looked at them both.

"What do you mean?" I asked. "They killed Tarzan, Kitten, and Taz."

"We don't know that," Salem pointed out.

"That's why we came here in the first place," Eric said. "We were going to interrogate them. Not kill them." He nodded to the wreckage. "Look what we did. It's wrong."

"Yeah. It's like we're as bad as them," Salem agreed. That's what made me realize what I was doing. Salem and Eric _agreed_ that I had gone overboard. And they never agreed on anything! I might have killed Erasers in that van and essentially Erasers were once just kids like us. I remembered Jason when we were both in School in cages side by side. He'd had the same scared look I had.

I thought for a moment and then nodded.

"Look. This is hard for all of us. But we don't have to sink to their level," Salem said. "The Flock never had to kill anyone." I nodded in agreement and looked at the ground ashamed of myself. I looked at the pistol that I'd stolen, that I'd instructed Eric to use. This _was_ wrong.

"Okay," I said forcing myself to leave my shame for another time. I had a smoking wreckage to deal with right this second. "I promise, everything will be normal when we're through here. We just have to talk to the Erasers, threaten them a little bit, and see if they know anything about the accident at the fair." Salem and Eric nodded.

Salem gave me a quick hug as we walked toward the toppled over van. I smiled weakly knowing that she was just trying to comfort me.

We were almost to the van when a furry fist punched right through the glass. Shards dropped everywhere.

"CAAAAAAAT!" said a voice. My eyes went wide and I was forced to stop in my tracks. No... It couldn't be. "CAAAAAAAAT!"

Taz jumped out of the broken window and ran right up to me in his Eraser form.

"Oh my god..." Salem breathed.

Taz was alive.

* * *

Yaaaay!!! Thank you all you fantastical readers and reviewers!!!!!!


	41. The Plan

I do not own Maximum Ride!

But I do own my characters! So there!

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

There Hunter was right in front of us. The psycho that had tried to kill _my_ Cat. Who had convinced her to jump off a freakin' ten story building! And he had the nerve to show his face around us again.

Forgetting where I was and that I was just a few seconds ago trying to get Kitten to calm down I straightened and stood out of my seat.

"Please, everyone sit down," the kid named Fang ordered us sternly. I couldn't hear him. Hunter stared at me cross legged in his seat completely unafraid. This time, Cat wasn't here to stop me from pounding him into the ground until he couldn't get up anymore.

"Argggh!" I jumped at Hunter. Suddenly excruciating pain buzzed through my entire body. Stupid collar! I grabbed on it, writhing on the floor trying pull it off.

"_Arrêter!_" Kitten pleaded Dr. Lareaux. The pain stopped. I could smell the burnt hair in the air. How long had it been since I shaved? I felt the stubble of my mane all around my neck.

"This stops now!" Iggy shouted. "I don't care if you have personal histories!" Iggy 2 was looking in mostly in our direction, but not completely. I looked at Hunter who looked at me like he was trying not to laugh. Argh! I just wanted to pull off his arm and beat him with it!

"Just sit down, Tarzan," Kitten whispered. She sat in between Hunter and I. I felt guilty that she was trying to difuse the situation when I was the oldest one here.

"So," Hunter said mockingly. "What are thy biddings, masters?" Fang 2 grinned at Gasman 2.

"Masters. I kind of like that," Fang said. Gasman chuckled.

"Way to go," I grumbled. Kitten elbowed me in the gut hard, but to me it was no more than a poke.

Dr. Lareaux went on in French.

"Dr. Lareaux says it will be your three's job to make a unit. To work as a team. Therefore, you will be in training for sabotage, recon, and assassination," Iggy (or Iggy's evil clone) said. Gasman 2 looked down at Kitten. She crossed one leg over the other and folded her arms. Her eyes narrowed dangerously. I had never been more proud.

"Iggy, Gasman, and I will train you," Fang's evil clone said.

"We don't work for traitors," Kitten said bravely. I agreed silently. She looked at Hunter and then back again. "At least Tarzan and I don't." She looked at Dr. Lareaux.

"_Ainsi. Baisez-vous_," she said. Dr. Lareaux frowned. Whatever she said it wasn't very nice. He held up something that looked like a garage door opener and pressed the button. Kitten let out a quick scream of pain. I touched her shoulder.

"You haven't taught her many manners," Iggy 2 said villainously.

"Yeah. Well, its tough to raise a kid who's been abused in a laboratory her whole life," I said. Iggy 2 ignored me in midsentence and jumped down from the stage. Dr. Lareaux handed him the garage door opener from hell as he walked by. Fang and Gasman followed behind him.

"Come on," Gasman said. We reluctantly stood up and followed them to our room.

Our rooms had a highly original decorator, naturally. White walls, two dog crates, and one actual cage. Knowing there was absolutely no way I could possibly fit in a dog crate I assumed the cage was mine. Iggy waited expectedly at the door of the cage for me to get inside. After the experience in School, not to mention the freakin' ferris wheel, I was a little hesitant to get inside.

A sharp shock made me jump. I gave this Iggy a bad look and entered. The door shut behind me. We were locked up again.

"Keep in mind, it doesn't have to be this way," Iggy said as he and the other two evil clones headed toward the door. "Work your way to the top and the white coats will gladly let you out of the cages. They'll give you normal soft beds like we have." The door closed behind him and the lights turned off.

I sighed in the dark and sat on the floor.

"Okay," I thought out loud closing my eyes. "What would Cat do?"

"This is stupid," Kitten grumbled under her breath from one of the dog crates. She hugged her knees to her chest. There was a moment of quiet.

"Guess what?" Hunter said in the darkness. Neither of us answered him. "There are no cameras in here."

"You've given us no reason to trust you," I said. "In fact, you've given us every reason _not_ to trust you."

"You're forgetting that I can get in people's heads," Hunter said. "The white coats are tough to get into. With the help of the Angel clone, they've designed something that keeps me out of their heads. Well, for the most part anyway."

"The _real_ Angel wouldn't do that," Kitten pouted softly.

"There's a glitch in their device though. I've been here long enough to get around it only just barely. Though I haven't been able to do much damage," he reported.

"Whoop dee freakin' do," I said spitefully. Hunter growled. His face twisted angrily into a snarl.

"If I were trying to get your approval I would go into your head and get it myself!" Hunter snapped startling Kitten in her cage. I looked at him giving the attention he demanded. "The little blonde one. I got into his head."

"And?" Kitten said losing the threat in her voice.

"And I've been able to make some adjustments," Hunter said cryptically. I cocked an eyebrow at him. He looked over to Kitten. "That means, _you_ especially need to start minding your manners." Kitten crossed her arms.

"I can't do that," she said.

"And why not?" Hunter asked looking slightly annoyed.

"Cat said to never ever do what the bad guys say. Which means I can be as mean and cuss as much as I want," Kitten said.

"You've been cussing in french? Kitten, you know better than that," I scolded like a good parent was supposed to.

"What? They're bad guys. I don't care if I hurt their feelings," Kitten said.

"That's not the point," I said. Hunter had more than enough of our babbling.

"Would you two stop it? This is not a life lesson! THIS IS AN ESCAPE PLAN!" Hunter shouted angrily gripping the bars of the dog crate.

"Hey, kid, could you say that a little louder? I'm not sure every Eraser on the face of the planet HEARD YOU!" I snapped back at him. Kitten giggled at Hunter's frustration with us both. I smiled at her. Leave it to Kitten to find some reason to laugh in this hell hole.

"Okay, I got into Gasman's head. He wants female companionship. He misses his sister, Angel's clone, who died a long time ago in the Itex Riots," Hunter said quickly so that neither of us could interrupt him anymore. "So..." He turned and looked at Kitten. She looked at him and then me.

"What? You want me to be his friend?" Kitten asked.

"Something like that," he said. Kitten's green eyes bugged out.

"But he's an evil clone! And anyway, he farts all the time," she said. I snickered.

"Very mature," Hunter said to me specifically. "And there's nothing to worry about kiddo. Pay special attention to him. The big guy and I will be your wingmen. I'll be in his head as much as I can. But you won't need me too much." He smiled a brotherly smile.

"You're cute enough to win him over on your own," he said. I looked at him oddly. So did Kitten. Hunter looked down. "Sorry. That sounded more like a compliment than creepy in my head."

Kitten giggled.

I looked at Hunter oddly as he smiled with satisfaction. With the acceptance he could never get with us before. He'd made Kitten laugh. And smile. In a dog cage. Maybe he wasn't so useless after all. Maybe he was our ticket out of here.

* * *

Yay! Good times everyone. Good times...


	42. Persuasion Of All Sorts

I do not own Maximum Ride! I do own my characters. Sooo...yippee! Sorry for the delay everyone. It's been just a tad bit dramatic here and its been hard to get around to writing. Thank you all for your patience if you're continuing reading this story. If you're not, then you're probably not reading this.

* * *

**Cat's POV: **

I picked up Taz and twirled while squealing with joy. Finally! A reason to hope! Taz laughed happily and then burped a threat to puke everywhere in the dizziness. I held him up and kissed his cheek over and over. Salem rushed at me and gave me a huge hug squeezing me and Taz together. Eric just stared in awe, the gun hanging loosely on his finger.

I couldn't believe it. My little boy! But as usual, our moment of happiness was cut short.

"What! The hell!" came a scream of outrage toward the toppled over van. My smile disappeared and I held Taz just a little bit tighter in my arms. Jason kicked out the door sending it flying off its hinges into the middle of the road.

"Oh, calm down, you big baby," I growled as Jason pulled himself out of the car. Layla came out behind him holding a bloodied ravaged arm. Eric tightened his grip around the gun again.

"Don't move," Eric said. I looked at him, he met my gaze. I read his look and nodded. Good, he was only bluffing.

"You ran us off the road!"

"You stole our baby! What did you think we were going to do? Let you?" I hissed.

"I think my arm is broken," Layla said quietly probably thinking our sensitive ears couldn't pick up their whispering.

"What about the others?" Jason questioned.

"They're out," was all she said. He gave an acknowledging nod.

"Where are Tarzan and Kitten?" I demanded to know, interrupting their not-so-private conversation. Eric cocked the gun to add persuasion. Jason and Layla exchanged looks.

"How should we know?" Layla asked rudely. She cradled her arm. I suddenly had an idea. I wasn't sure if it was a good one or not, but being a charge means you have to make a call sometimes. I pointed at the female Eraser.

"You," I said. "Get in the Hummer."

Layla chuckled.

"I beg your pardon," she said light heartedly.

BANG! The gunshot rang out.

I looked at the Erasers with wide eyes behind my sunglasses as I tried to make the rest of me look composed. Both of them jumped and were momentarily stunned. There was a string of smoke floating out of the barrel from Eric's hand. He looked just as surprised as Salem and I did. I smiled weakly. Our Eric knew how to make a tough call too. That was why he was third in command.

"Get in the car, or your arm's going to feel a lot worse," Eric said pointing the gun at Layla. I felt horrible as he did. Not just because of the look of Layla's face, but making him do this. He didn't want anyone to know, but he loved the way Layla looked at him every time she had the opportunity to help us. He cared about her, but at least he was denying it. That was good enough for me. As long as he didn't do anything stupid. I thought about Tarzan and Kitten. I'd put a thousand Erasers at gun point for the slightest chance of them being alive. Layla looked to Jason for a command.

Jason had nothing to say. It was obvious that if he was told that if ever he was in this situation his order would be to sacrifice Layla. But he was having a hard time doing it. I watched curiously. Did Jason have a heart again? Was that why he helped us all those times? Did he actually give a crap for Layla?

"Come on, Layla," Eric ordered sharply. She frowned at him and walked toward us, swaggering her hips confidently. As she passed him, she gave him a glare that would make a rampaging lunatic with a gun freeze in his tracks.

"You're going to regret this," she said.

Maybe we would. And maybe Tarzan and Kitten were alive. That made it all worth the risk.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

There is one thing I have to say, so far School in France is way better than School in America. Maybe we just haven't hit the worst of it yet, but this morning Gasman (the revised evil clone version, of course) woke all three of us up. He went right up to each of our cages and let us out one by one. Of course he was armed with the button that could send an electrical charge through our bodies in an instant. I watched curiously as he walked right up and undid my lock.

"What are you doing?" I asked. The young boy shrugged at me.

"If you want to stay in the cages, then by all means stay here," Gasman said. He turned and walked expecting us to follow. "Don't bother running. You won't make it into daylight before I fry your butts." I looked at Hunter for an explanation. He flicked a stray strand of his dark hair out of his eyes.

"We eat with the Erasers in the cafeteria," he explained.

"Is that a bad thing or a good thing?" Kitten asked.

"They might hate us, but they're not allowed to touch us. The white coats paid good money for us," Hunter said. Kitten cocked her head to the side thoughtfully. It was a strange concept. Erasers who didn't beat the crap out of you? What next? The food isn't going to be a nasty slop?

Nope. The food was still slop. Gasman left us and joined his brothers of the flock clones at a table across the cafeteria. The white cafeteria was filled with Erasers everywhere. Apparently they came by the dozen. Guards stood at the catwalks above us with readied tranquilizing guns. Occasionally a whitecoat would walk across them and look down at us.

"This is weird," Kitten commented.

"Trust me, its not as great as it seems," Hunter said ironically. No School was great. Maybe better than other Schools, but never great. "The tests are ten times harder. They give you time to walk around and let you feel like you're somewhat free to keep us from going completely from revolting." Hunter stopped talking for a moment. He leaned underneath the table. I looked at Kitten with furrowed brows. She shrugged.

Hunter came back up with a small black device in his hand. He grinned.

"I knew it," he said holding it between his forefingers. "They were listening." I held out my hand. He dropped it in my palm. I set it on the table, made a fist, and pounded it on the surface. Now it was nothing but a little pile of plastic. Hunter raised his brows impressed. We looked over at the flock who happened to be looking at us at the same moment. They all turned away and continued talking.

"Heh," Hunter said grinning coyly. "Alright, kiddo. You're up." Kitten straightened in her seat.

"What?" she asked. I cocked an eyebrow at Hunter in warning. No one told the pride what to do unless they were me or Cat. He didn't see my warning.

Hunter nodded toward the flock.

"Go join them. Sit next to Gasman and make nice," he said to her. Kitten looked at me.

"Do I have to?" she asked.

"Do you want to get out of here?" Hunter asked before I could respond. Kitten looked at me. I gave a nod.

"The minute you feel uncomfortable come back and join us," I told her gently. She smiled weakly. I gave her a full on grin of cat confidence. "Use those big green eyes of yours."

"What do you mean?" she asked innocently. I gave her an unamused look.

"Don't give me that. The big watery eyes you use when you want something from me or Cat. Don't pretend like you don't know what I'm talking about," I said. Kitten gave a small pout and picked up her tray.

"Fine," she sighed. Hunter and I watched her make her carefully across the room. She had her head held high trying not to look at the Erasers who were also watching her pass by their tables without so much as a second look. My muscles tensed instinctively. There went my little girl walking through a path of monsters to do something I asked her to do.

Hunter seemed more relaxed. And why shouldn't he be? He didn't care about her the same way I did. She was like my own little sister. Or daughter.

Luckily the room fell silent as the scene unfolded and Hunter and I could hear every word with cat precision.

"Hi," Kitten said. She didn't even hesitate a second before she sat down right beside the little winged clone. Gasman looked pleasantly surprised. Iggy and Fang? Not so much. I darted a look towards Hunter. His eyes were narrowed in concentration. His eyes seemed to be burrowing a hole into their heads trying to look inside. "Mind if I sit here?" Kitten asked already unloading her meal onto their table.

Fang 2 looked over at our table.

"Why don't you sit with them?" he asked. Kitten looked back at us. So did every Eraser who was eavesdropping on the conversation. Hunter and I exchanged looks. Suddenly I had a brilliant idea. I smirked. Hunter seemed to sense what I was thinking.

"Don't-" he started.

Too late.

I leaned over the table and punched him in the face. Lightly, mind you... But lightly for me is like a saying a sumo wrestler "lightly" sat on a young child.

Hunter toppled over his seat and fell on the floor. Kitten turned back toward the flock.

"They won't stop fighting. I can't eat over there. Is it okay if I eat with you?" she said in her famous cute little girl voice. Then she did it. She batted her big green eyes in the Gasman's direction. Bull's eye. Gasman's expression softened.

"Sure," he said scooting over.

Hunter started to bring himself back up in his chair. The wuss touched his face and hissed. It was only a shiner. Nothing to be too concerned about. I smiled and continued digging into my own food. He sat down at his seat giving me an evil look. Then he started for his tray of food. As he picked up his plastic fork to bring it down on the slop I pulled his tray away from him. Hunter picked up his eyes, even more pissed off than he already was with me.

"By the way," I said still overjoyed with the fact that I got to land a free sucker punch on the murderer. "No one tells anyone in the pride to do anything but me and Cat. Since I don't see Cat around, I'm in charge. You got that?" He didn't answer. He just took his tray back and continued to eat.

* * *

It's good to be back! 


	43. Ve Have Vays of Making You Talk

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all these characters.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

So, Jason cussed us all out as we loaded up our hostage (I couldn't believe we'd taken a hostage) into the Hummer. The rest of the Erasers were beginning to emerge from the wreckage so we got the hell out of there. It was awkward in the car (naturally) Layla was extremely pissed. She would just sit in the middle row with Eric beside her, gun in hand beside her broken arm.

But everytime I looked at her, I felt this overwhelming sense of guilt.

For one: I had turned her "mate" against her who now had a constant eye on her.

But also Tarzan and Kitten were gone. Possibly dead. Why should I care what happens to her? It would be a small revenge. We all knew Kandi had dozens more Erasers to replace her with and more on the way. That had to suck knowing that now that she was a hostage no one was going to even attempt to save her.

"What?" Layla growled at me. I realized I'd been staring at her through the rearview mirror again. I had to focus. Try not to think of Eric. Try not to think of all the times they helped us. Try not to think about how they took Taz. Try not to think what might have happened to the rest of the pride.

"Hey, Cat," Salem finally spoke up from the backseat with Taz. "Where are we going?"

This was a popular question in the pride. And it was always incredibly difficult to answer.

"To a hotel," was my immediate answer. "Salem, you're going to have to get to the register and book all the rooms around our room."

"Why?"

Because I _may_ have to try and pry some answers out of Layla the hard way.

"Can you just do that for me?" I asked her. Salem nodded reluctantly and went back to trying to teach Taz how to say her name.

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

So it was our first day of training. Kitten was incredibly good at getting into Gasman's circle of trust. I'm telling you, no one can resist those big eyes of hers. She stood beside him looking down at the clouded room through glass panes. Hunter was inside...somewhere. You couldn't see through all the gas. His vitals were being monitored on the computer Fang stood in front of.

"Hey Fang," Kitten said. I looked at her protectively. Nah, I shouldn't worry. She was too cute to hurt.

"Fang." The clone-bird-kid kept his focus on the vitals.

"Hey Fang," Kitten said. Fang finally turned.

"What?" he asked irritated.

"It the real Fang has a crush on the real Max, then does that mean you have a crush on the clone Max?" Kitten asked. Fang just stared at her. Gasman snorted and then started to snicker. Even Iggy let a smile spread quietly across his face.

Fang decided to ignore the comment with a huff.

"Vitals are reaching critical," Fang reported. "He's panicking." I tried to

"Fine. Let him in," Iggy said. He opened the door. The gas was vaccuumed out of the room and Hunter fell in through the doorway chocking and tears streaming down his face. I wondered if I should go help him up. But let's face it, this guy had proved himself jackass too many times. Hunter finally picked himself up and staggered over to the seat beside me as he cursed under his breath.

"You. You're next," Iggy said looking sort of in my direction.

"I don't have to. I have a doctor's note," I said smiling innocently at Iggy knowing, since I knew he couldn't see me.

"You all have to become immune to tear gas if you're going to be assassins," Iggy said.

"I'm already immune to tear gas. Didn't you read the doctor's note?" That may have been the wrong thing to say. He was extremely sensitive about his blindness. But then again that's what made it so much fun. "What are you? Blind?"

The collar buzzed sending volts and volts of electricity through my body until I writhed on the floor. And even then he still had his finger on the button.

"Stop! Stop it!" Kitten begged.

"Come on, Ig," Gasman finally cut in. Now he let finally let me go. The pain resided and all I wanted to do was lie down on the floor and breath. But I couldn't. Not in front of the would-be heroes that took down the Almighty Itex. So I stood up and forced myself into the gas chamber for another horrible session.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

The deed was done. All Salem had to do was reach over the desk and reach for the booking computer and we were in. They barely noticed the band of dirty mutant kids walking by. Even the one with the broken arm who discreetly had a gun to her back. Now we were all sitting around our hotel bedroom. I looked to Eric, my current right hand man. I had a feeling he was hurting inside having to watch Layla all this time, but it was just something that had to be done.

"Salem," I said adjusting my stolen sunglasses. She picked up her head. "Don't worry about this. Why don't you take Taz for a walk around the hotel? Come back around four unless something bad happens. In which case pull a fire alarm to warn us." Salem nodded.

"Come on, Taz," she said picking up the baby and placing him up on her hip.

I sat on the edge of the bed beside the chair we forced Layla to sit in. Once the door was closed I turned my attention back to her.

"Backstabber," Layla said immediately. "We helped you escape all those times."

"Only when it was beneficial for you," I pointed out. Layla looked at Eric venomously. His expression softened stricken with guilt.

"Not all the time," she said. She lowered her head and shook it. "Jason was right. Cats are nothing but selfish, stuck up-" She didn't have enough time to finish talking when I slapped her. Eric flinched.

"Cat!" he whispered. I stared at him in shock.

"Eric, we can't let her talk about us that way. We'd be an embarrassment to hostage takers everywhere," I hissed. I turned back to her and shook my head. She looked unamused.

"Why do you bother running from Itron?" she asked.

Wait a minute. Weren't we the ones who were supposed to be doing the questioning?

"If you just did what they wanted you live a much better life," Layla said. She glanced at Eric.

"Why do you put up with Itron? Why don't you just run away and live free?" I retorted.

"You can't be free. It's not who we were made to be," Layla said solemnly. "Besides, I have a sense of loyalty. Your parents abandoned you there. All of ours did. Either that or they donated their sperm and eggs to make you. Itron is the best shot you got."

"My parents tried to save me from the School," I said my blood rushing through my veins. "Thank you very much." Layla glanced at me suddenly realizing I was right.

"Layla," Eric said sitting cross legged on the floor. "Where are Tarzan and Kitten?" Layla shrugged. Eric and I exnchanged glances.

"One more time," I said. "Where are Tarzan and Kitten?" Layla chuckled hald heartedly.

"Yeah. Maybe if you ask me a second time the answer will suddenly pop up in my head," Layla said. I bit my lip. I was _really_ hoping to avoid this. I reached for her broken arm and twisted it behind her back. Layla gasped and tears flowed uncontrollably as she let out a delayed howl of pain. I looked to Eric to make sure he was still on board.

His eyes were cold and distant. Good.

"Any ideas of where they might be?" I asked. Layla hesitated and then slowly shook her head. "Wrong answer."

"See if Jason and I ever help you again!" Layla said through her tears of pain.

"We don't need your help," I lied and twisted again. "All you need to do is give us some sort of information. Some sort of useful information of course because you'll be coming along on our little quest for them and if we don't find them, then..."

"I DON'T KNOW WHERE THEY ARE!" Layla cried so loud that I had to cover her mouth for fear some innocent bystander might hear. "Some...Sometimes..." She stopped suddenly. I let my hand off of her mouth. She shook her head.

"Never mind," she said. I was suddenly angry again.

"No. Not never mind. Sometimes what?" She wouldn't say anything. I wrapped my hand around her already broken arm threateningly. She gasped and then immediately shut her mouth. "I have an idea. How about you just tell us if they're alive or not and we'll give you a one hour break. We'll order some room service, you can get whatever you want. We'll even pay for it. At least the person who's debit card we stole will pay for it." Layla looked out the window and sighed. Then she looked at Eric who mouthed at her.

'Just tell us,' he mouthed.

"Last I saw of them, they were alive," Layla informed. My heart slowed down considerably with relief. I hadn't even realized how tensed I was just waiting for that one answer.

"When was this?"

"Last week. Just before Kandi took them away," she said.

* * *

Yay! More to come when I think of more to write. (Which should be soon.) 


	44. Betrayal

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all these characters.

I dedicate this chapter to GuitarBlonde! Why? Because I feel like it, that's why. Here ya go everybody. I hope this makes up for my mysterious disappearance.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

"And I want twelve rare burgers," Layla said as I held the phone to my ear.

"Twelve?" Salem echoed. She and Taz had come back for lunch while we took a break from torturing our hostage. Which I still felt horrible about, as well we should. What we were doing wasn't exactly humane. But, in our defense, how many hostages get twelve hamburgers, two sundaes, and a Dr. Pepper float? I was a little afraid they wouldn't put in our order, but when our debit card number cleared the chef had no problem whatsoever.

I hung up the phone.

"So Kitten and Tarzan are okay?" Salem said with wide yellow eyes. Layla looked away.

"What I said was last I saw them they were okay," Layla pointed out.

"What do you think happened to them?" Eric asked. Layla sighed. She didn't want to answer anymore questions. That was obvious. But she reluctantly answered.

"Well... Itron has been doing this thing. They..." She looked like she was debating saying this out loud. Eric looked at her expectingly. "They've been selling experiments even some Erasers have been reassigned to foreign people. Government-looking people."

"You think they've been sold as trained soldiers, just like the Flock almost got sold to the Chinese that one time!" Salem gasped.

Layla looked at me tiredly. "I thought you said we get to take a break from interegation." She was right. She deserved that much.

"No more questions, Salem," I said. Salem sighed.

"Hey, Eric?" she asked in almost a whine. Eric was _not_ in the best mood ever since Layla's time out from questioning began.

"What?" he grumbled.

"Can you help me steal a laptop?" she asked.

"We only steal what we need," I said.

"What a great basis of morals," Layla grumbled under her breath. Eric smiled in the slightest bit. My heart panged. Something about seeing them together made me want to wish them the best and hope love will triumph over our differences. But most of me worried.

What if Eric did like her more than us? I mean, what if Tarzan was somewhere being brainwashed to be a bad guy and I had to fight him? Would I risk everything just to be with him?

I shook my head of the thought. Where had that come from? No, no. The pride _always_ came first. I have always known that.

"What were your parents like?" Layla asked quietly. At first I thought she was talking to me. I opened my mouth to answer when I saw her looking at Eric. I had nearly forgotton. Eric wasn't always raised in the School like the rest of us. He had a mom and everything until he was ten.

Eric looked down at the carpet. The gun had been set aside. I wasn't that worried, since I knew from experience that our reflexes were faster than an Eraser's.

"My mom was a whitecoat," he said swallowing hard. "Her name was Dr. Relow. My dad left when I was really little. He was a loser. A drifter. I don't even remember his name. My mom's name was Shelly." He smiled a little bit and then it faded.

"I wish I knew what she was before she died," he added. Layla's expression softened.

"Do you hate her?" Layla asked abruptly. Eric stiffened. Layla clarified, "Because she worked for Itron? Because she did bad things, even if they weren't to you?" Eric met her gaze.

"I could never hate my mom. I love her," he said. There was something odd about the conversation. How they stared at each other. It was like there was some secret code mixed with the regular words they were using. Layla smiled, even after flinching with the pain in her arm.

"Huh?" Salem interrupted as she just as confused as I was.

"Uh oh!" Taz cried suddenly getting everyone's attention as he ran for the door. A knock came at the door.

"Room service," said the person on the other side.

"Taz, get away from the door," I said nudging him aside with my foot. Taz reluctantly moved as he whined. I opened the door to see someone with a cart of food. He grinned menacingly at me. How had I not known? My shoulders slumped.

"Oh sh-" I sighed tiredly as a fist came flying at me. I fell backwards on my tail, my sunglasses broke on contact. I rolled onto my feet just in time to see Layla run right by me. Of course the person who'd punched me was none other than...

Come on. You can guess it. You're far enough in our story that you probably know.

If you guessed Jason, you're right! Ding, ding, ding!

I started to pick myself up again when the barrell of a gun was turned on me. I had to blink twice to register who was holding that gun.

"Eric?" I said. Eric's striped face was cold.

"Eric?" Layla echoed in shock.

"We've run long enough, Cat. I'm tired of this," Eric said. He sighed and nodded at the Erasers. "I'm going with them." Salem started to move towards me. "Stay there, Sale!" Salem stopped for fear of my safety. I put my hands up.

"Eric, don't do this," I pleaded. "Don't break up the pride when it just started coming back together." The sincerity in his face made me worry.

"So what? You're going to turn us all in?" I asked. Jason smiled and put a gentle hand on Eric's shoulder.

"No. I think Layla's boyfriend will be prize enough. See you next time, Cat," Jason said saluting with two fingers. Eric, Layla, and Jason left so suddenly. They just shut the door on us. I jumped up and pulled on it. We were locked in! I pulled and pulled. Salem came to my side.

"Salem, the doors got one of those card locks. Do you think you can open it?" I asked her. She touched the lock. It beeped.

"I can't! The problem isn't electronic. There's something on the handle!" Salem said panicked. She shook the door handle along with me. Taz pounded on the door with his little Eraser paws.

"Uh oh!" he shouted. We all stopped and listened. What was that beeping?

Beep...

Beep...

Beep...

I phased through the door sticking my head out on the other side. There was a black device stuck on the handle with wires coming out of it, and red numbers counting down. I've seen enough action movies to know what that was.

"Bomb!" I picked up Taz and ran towards the bathroom dragging Salem by her hand. I shut the door behind me and locked it. I put Taz between my legs and covered his ears with my knees while I plugged my own ears. Salem covered her ears just in time.

BOOM!

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

"What do you think Cat's doing right now?" Kitten asked in the darkness from her own dog crate. I swallowed as she voiced my own thoughts. Hunter shuffled in his own crate. We were all exhausted. Today had started out great, you know, eating lunch with the other Erasers and not getting the crap kicked out of you, Kitten making friends with an evil clone as part of our own evil plan, and punching Hunter wasn't so bad either.

But after the tear gas chamber, let's just say the clone Flock got their revenge for every stupid thing we said just to irritate them. I think Iggy's favorite was being blindfolded in a room and getting swarmed by Erasers. We might as well have been blind, and Hunter was unable to get into any of their heads without meditating first. So we were beaten up pretty bad.

Kitten was black and blue all over. Hunter had scars over his spotted face that would never fade for sure. And me?...I hadn't even taken the time to assess my own damage. I just knew that I was in too much pain to pick myself off the floor. And tomorrow we just got to do it all over again. Assassin training was worse than any test the School had ever given us.

"Cat's looking for us. I bet she's close to England by now," I said.

"Pssh," Hunter snorted from his cage sensing my comforting lie.

"You got something to say?" I said in warning.

"Yeah. That's total bull," he said.

"It is not," Kitten whispered.

"Is too."

"Is NOT!" Kitten said loudly.

"Kitten, don't yell," I said flinching from a throbbing headache.

"But he's lying," she said defensively. She sniffled. I could tell whatever was happening in the darkness, she was crying. I hated that I was in a different cage. I couldn't comfort her.

"And tomorrow's only going to be worse," Hunter said.

"Well, gee whiz, Mr. Sunshine. Thanks for lifting our spirits," I said.

"Honesty is the best policy," he said.

"Ignorance is bliss," I retorted.

We were quiet. But none of us were asleep.

"Cat forgot about me. Why wouldn't she forget about you?" Hunter asked. It didn't seem like he was trying to come across as a brat. He sounded like it was a true question.

"Because she loves us," Kitten said. "Because we're her family. Her pride. She would do the same for Taz, Salem, and Eric."

"Why not me?" Hunter asked quietly.

"Maybe because you tried to kill her?" Kitten said.

"Kitten, stop that," I said. You couldn't help but be sympathetic for the guy. He always expected us, the heroic strangers, to one day save him and accept him into the pride. Then we never came. The Erasers came and he realized we would never come. It was enough to drive an already emotionally unstable kid over the edge.

"She could have rescued me before that. Salem and I could have been friends. I've always like learning about electronics. I could've helped fight off the Erasers. I could have rode in the backseat of your stolen cars and meditated so I could be ready for them. I could make people want to give us stuff, like food or hotel rooms. Maybe I could've even met the Director, whoever she was, and made her kill herself. Or at least make her stop wanting to make mutant freaks," Hunter said. Kitten and I listened in the darkness. The room was thick with guilt.

"Then again," he said. "Maybe not." He turned around in his crate with his back to us and tried to sleep. I heard Kitten shuffle around her cage and curl up into a little cat-nap ball and try to sleep. I turned away from them both and rested my eyes. But I did not sleep at all.

* * *

Aw... Any suggestions? Anything you guys want to see in the story? Let me know and I'll see how it fits in my master plan. 


	45. Relief, Pain, and Love

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all these characters.

* * *

**Cat's POV: **

And then there was three... Three more kitties driving down a lone road with shards of rubble and dust in our hair, adding onto the layer of grime that came with living in abandoned houses and old motels with green water.

Now it was Salem, Taz, and I in a small Camry and fitting comfortably. Taz was sniffling in the backseat. I had Salem turn around and console him every once and a while. I sighed heavily. I missed Tarzan more than ever. We were partners. We accepted equal responsibility. I felt horrible.

"He's asleep," Salem reported.

"Good," I said sleepily. It was dark on the road and once again we were wandering aimlessly.

"Cat," Salem said. I tried not to look at her. "How did Jason find us?"

"I left the room to go to the bathroom," I said. "Eric must've left the room long enough for her to get to the phone. Or maybe he even helped her make a phone call. I don't know." She nodded accepting my answer.

"We still don't know where Tarzan and Kitten are," she said. I nodded.

"Don't worry, honey. We're working on it," I said. I glanced at her for a moment. I smiled at her. Salem stared back at me suddenly realizing something.

"_We_?" Salem echoed. "Eric didn't leave the pride."

"Technically he did," I said still smiling. "He's just going to be feeding us information through email." Salem gasped and then punched me in the shoulder. "Ow!"

"Why didn't you tell me Eric would be double crossing them! You had me worried!" Salem whined. I shrugged.

"I'm sorry, Salem, but you're a terrible liar. You can see every ounce of guilt in your face," I said. Salem slumped in her seat with relief.

"Next time I see that jerk, I'm going to slap him silly," she said, but still she smiled. Then suddenly she was serious. "Wait... We're leaving him alone with Layla and Jason. With _Layla_?" I nodded matter of factly pretending there was nothing wrong with that.

"Cat, he loves her," Salem said. I snorted.

"He doesn't love her. He has a crush on her," I said. "He loves us. He loves the pride."

"And Layla," Salem said. "Cat, she's done everything but freakin' purposed to him. And he gets all blushy and giggly every time she's around. She's gone easy on him in fights. Cat, what if she turns him against us!" I knew this already. I'm not stupid. I'm just desperate.

"Calm down, Salem," I said using my leader-voice. She immediately shrank back in her seat. Then she smiled again.

"Well, I guess this means stealing a laptop is necessary now," she said cocking an eyebrow. Her dark furry face glowed smugly in the night.

"Ah, damn. You're right," I sighed defeatedly. "Okay, okay. I guess you earned it after what Eric and I put you through..." Salem pumped her fist by her side.

"Yes!"

* * *

**Tarzan's POV:**

I fell to my knees as did Hunter and Kitten on either side of me. We were exhausted. We were more than exhausted, if that was possible without being dead. The collars. That was how they had us. All the flock clones had was a little garage clicker in their hand. And yet after an hour straight of being electrocuted it was worse than any other form of torture.

And I couldn't help but look at Kitten, her white-blonde hair was a complete mess. Matted with sweat and her face streaked with tears.

If you want to know what happened, then okay. Well, the white coats de France found out why Kitten was so attached to Gasman 2. Of course they told the flock. And the mock-Gasman was none too happy to figure out that we were messing with his head and Kitten was only pretending to be his friend.

So they'd gone ahead and resorted to drastic measures for getting our allegiance. The worst part was that it was painful. And it was working really well.

"Say it!" Gasman said. Iggy and Fang were standing by watching us. One by one, we slowly got up to our knees. I looked at Kitten again. Her legs were shaking beneath her own weight. She couldn't even stand! How could anyone do this to a kid?

"Stand up!" Evil Fang shouted at Kitten.

"I'm trying!" Kitten said trying to hold back the tears like Cat had taught her to do so well. Gasman's finger lingered over the button that was going to buzz her again.

Without warning my rage took over. I roared and charged toward them all. I had Iggy on the ground when more blinding pain made me stagger and spasm onto my hands and knees. Iggy picked himself up and straightened his clothes.

"You," he said to me. "Say it!"

More pain! I had to do anything to make the pain go away. Kitten and Hunter were watching me. They knew I was in charge. They must be in the same pain as me though. I thought about what it meant to be a leader. Sometimes people in charge have to surrender for their people. Sometimes pride, as ironic as the wording was, was not worth the fight.

"I-" I said pushing myself to my feet. Suddenly Fang 2 picked me up by the ground and dragged me to my feet. Those bird-kids are strong for a bunch of skinny sticks.

"Yes?" he said waiting for the rest of it.

"I am a tool for Itron," I said with a dry mouth.

"All of you!" With that our spirits were broken.

"I am a tool for Itron," we all chorused together. And then there was no more pain. Finally Kitten and Hunter were at ease. Cat and the others didn't matter anymore. I had to protect what I had now. I mean, who knows? Maybe everyone else was in China or Antarctica or something becoming assassins for some other country.

One thing was sure for the three of us. We'd all lost this fight.

"Again! Louder!"

"I am tool for Itron!"

* * *

Dear Cat, Salem, and Taz (I guess. Even if you can't read this.)

I got to the school okay. It's kind of creepy to be back. But at least they don't want to run any tests on me. Well, not many anyways. They're training me to be an Eraser. I only found out a little about Tarzan and Kitten. They've been gone about three weeks, wherever they went. And Kandi was glad to get rid of them. She was also really, really, happy I left the pride. She says its unnatural for cats to have a social group. Hello? Have you ever heard of lions? Besides, we're not _all_ cat, we're human too. In fact, Taz isn't cat at all. Oh, by the way, Kandi really wants Taz back. She says he's a hazard to the pride and he needs to grow up with Erasers. I have no idea what she's talking about. Who cares? She's a nutjob. Don't worry bout me. Layla makes sure the other Erasers don't kick the crap out me.

Eric Relow

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

"Whatcha doin?" Layla said bounding over to my side. I quickly sent the email to the others and pulled up a game of solitaire.

"Just messin' around," I said. Layla looked over my shoulder and watched me move cards around.

"How do you play?" she asked.

"I honestly have no idea," I admitted. Layla giggled. And still we sat there at some white coat's desktop try futily to win a stupid game.

Okay, now that I have you're attention and Cat told you about the "big plan". (More like the "big stupid plan that will get us all, if not all then just me, killed.) And yet I had volunteered myself as soon as Cat told me she wanted to spy before she could even gather the courage to ask me to do it.

I'd only been here a day, but Dr. Kandi had welcomed my betrayal with open arms. Literally. She ran up and hugged me. (Don't worry. I bathed right afterward.) Her exact words were, "Oh! At least one of you has some sense!" I actually had the least sense for wanting to do this. Why did I want to do this again?

"I think that card goes here," Layla said pointing to the screen. I turned to look at her. Her long black hair was in a constant state of perfection. Her native american features were natural and exotic at the same time. Her laughter floated lighter than air... And whenever I thought about her I used metaphors like floating laughter. What was wrong with me?

She was perfect, but she was an Eraser. That was what was wrong with me. But she actually liked me! The pasty faced striped kid.

Oh yeah. That's why I volunteered for this stupid mission. Well, and to get Tarzan and Kitten back of course. Don't get me wrong, I'm not completely obsessed.

Suddenly the door opened and a group of white coats came in through the door. Layla leapt out of the chair and stood at attention. I took her lead and stood beside her. The white coat stopped and looked at me. The others around them with their nerdy glasses and clipboards.

"You," the one with her pencil in her mouth said. I gulped. This was stupid. Of course they were going to track the email! This was stupid! Cat, wherever you are, I'm going to kill you! She nodded at me. "You're this one's mate, are you not." She was referring to Layla of course. Layla held her breath.

Talk about being on the spotlight. I glanced her out of the corner of my eye while facing the white coat.

"Yes?" I said unsure of my answer. Stupid! Dumb answer! Just give a yes or no! That's all you had to do! "Yes. Yes, I am." Layla let out her breath and tried to hide her relief. She was in love with me. I should be glad, but this was temporary. I wasn't going to be a kitty Eraser forever. Sooner or later I was going to have to leave her.

"Good," the white coat said. She tapped me the tip of her pencil and looked to the others in her little group.

"This is Itron's first mixed breeding program. A tiger hybrid, with a canine hybrid aka, an Eraser," she said. "Of course, not now. They are too young. We find that if we pair the mates firstly, then they are less likely to mingle with others and spoil their genes. These two will be a fine couple when it is time to breed them. Moving on, I will showing you the Eraser training program..."

The group left us, Layla and I were alone. She smiled at me and laughed weakly.

"Well," she said. "That was awkward."

"Yeah," I agreed nervously. Layla took my hand.

"Forget them for now. I'll show you where the cafeteria is," Layla said leading me like a dog on a leash. I happily followed behind her.

* * *

Maybe its already too late to save them. Hmm...Only time will tell.

Suggestions are welcome! I can't come up with all this stuff by myself you know. I love you guys who are still reading this soap opera of a Maximum Ride story. You rock like the stones!


	46. Relationships and Questions for Readers

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all these characters. Well, at least most of them.

OMG! I just found Maximum Ride shirts! They have a hoodies with wings on the back! I WANT IT!

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

Salem was literally bouncing up and down in her seat. Taz and I were getting carsick just watching her. She squealed and clapped her hands happily.

"Salem, am I going to have to steal some Riddilin for you?" I teased as she enjoyed her brand new notebook, maybe just a tad too much.

"I got an email back from Fang!" she cried. I shot her a look, nearly crashing into the car in front of me.

"Huh?"

"Oh. And I got one from Eric too," Salem said less enthusiastically. She read me the email. Eric had gotten to school fine. He still had no real important news about Tarzan and Kitten. That was disappointing, but it had only been a day. And I was glad my little buddy had gotten there okay.

"What does the one from the Flock say?" I asked.

"_Dear Salem,_

_We received the information you quickly emailed us from the library about Itron. We asked around and it looks like you're right. Itex is up and running, it just took another name. Plus we've been running into a few Erasers lately. Don't worry. We're doing all we can to help. Email us if you get anymore information. We'll do the same, so stay online. _

_Fang (and the rest of the Flock)_" Salem read aloud.

I blinked and then slowly nodded.

"Okay. Salem, whatever you do never give out our location to them or anyone else online. And never mention where Eric is or what he's doing. We're not sure if anyone else is reading this or even if they're really the Flock," I said.

"Well, duh..." Salem said.

"Also, start doing some research. You're the computer wizard. Just do your thing," I instructed. Salem wriggled happily in her seat and focused on the screen.

"Gladly," she said.

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

Layla twisted her fork in her gruel as she stared at from across the table. She was always so... perfect and flawless. I always blushed when I saw her looking at me because I'm physically weird. I mean, I know she can turn into a big gigantic wolf-monster, but she can always change back. I'm always a short, greasy, pale striped kid.

She shouldn't like me as much as she does, no matter what the white coats had planned for us. It was going to suck really bad when I had to betray her. It was bad enough that I let Cat torture her and I put a gun to her. But I had to.

I sighed. Why did this have to be so complicated? Why couldn't she just come run with the pride?

"So," Layla said in an unusually happy tone. "Tell me more about your mom."

"Well," I said. I hadn't been forced to think about her for a long time. It was normally a subject I liked to avoid. Even with myself. "She was short. She was nice."

"Did she make cookies?" Layla asked giddily.

"Once," I said. "For my second grade class."

"Wow," Layla said looking away dreamily. "My mom's name is Rosemary Burke. She lives on a reservation in Oregon."

"Have you seen her recently?" I asked. Her face was sad. She sighed.

"I tried to. But when I saw her..." Layla started. She paused to take a sip of her bottled water before continuing. "She donated an egg. She didn't actually... have me or anything." Oh. Layla finally got to meet her and she was disappointed. I couldn't blame her. When I found out my mom's dark secret it was too late to confront her about it.

"I always wanted to meet my dad," Layla said. "He was a white coat. I always think about him whenever I have to go see a male white coat. I always look at him and see how old he is. What he looks like, you know, to see if he looks anything like me. Even though I look almost exactly like my mom."

"Well, well. If it isn't the newbie," came a new voice. Layla immediately scooted over and gave room for Jason to sit down. I smiled at him as politely and nuetrally as possible and looked down at my tray. The big, bad Eraser ruins everything...

"Hey," I greeted.

"So," Jason said. "When can we be expecting kuppies?"

"Kuppies?" Layla echoed.

"Yeah. Kittens/Puppies," Jason said. My food in my mouth leapt back in my throat and into my lungs. I coughed, gripping the table trying to keep from choking on my food. Layla patted me on the back. How embarrassing. "Or is it pittens?

"Not for a long while," Layla said giving one of her famous death glares.

"Well," Jason said. "Now that's I've made the situation thoroughly uncomfortable, I swiped something for you." Jason slid a file across the surface to Layla. He had one of his own that he opened up.

"I got a question," I said.

"Yes?"

"And Cat's always been too...too," I said trying to get the words out.

"Too much of a bitch?" Jason offered. I giggled imagining what Cat would say if she actually heard that.

"Too emotional to answer my question," I said. "Are you and Cat supposed to be mates?" Jason picked up his eyes and froze. Layla looked away from me and him, finding something much more interesting to pay attention to across the room.

"Ew," he said. "No."

"Oh," I said. "Well, okay."

"You know why?" Jason asked. I shrugged. He slid the file across the table to me. I looked at it and saw that it had all of Jason's information. His family, his medical history. Who would have guessed he was allergic to penicillin?

"What am I looking for?" I asked looking through the papers.

"Jason's her cousin," Layla clarified. "Her dad's sister is an egg donor somewhere in Salt Lake City." I started to choke on my food again. Layla once again patted my back.

"Why didn't you tell her?" I finally said. "She thinks you want to drag her back to the School to be part of the breeding program."

"I do. She's a bitch. I don't like her," Jason said with a shrug. "She's just not going to be _my_ mate."

"Then who...?" I started.

"She's going to be in the pure bred program," Layla said. Pure bred? Before I could think on it further, Layla and Jason were both ripping through Layla's file. Both looking from one file to the other. I watched as they mumbled to themselves.

"Yeah, yeah, we know who my mom is. Where's my dad's name?"

"Check the next page," Jason said reaching over and flipping the page.

"Lareaux," they both said together. Layla placed her finger on the name. "Dr. Lareaux."

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Jason found his file a long time ago," Layla said. "I only glanced at my file. That's how I knew who my mom was. But I wasn't sure about my dad's name. Jason told me his dad's name and I thought it sounded familiar." She slid over her file. I compared the names. They both had the same father's name.

"So...?"

"We're brother and sister I guess," Layla said.

"Half brother and sister," Jason corrected. Suddenly Dr. Kandi walked into the cafeteria. All the Erasers stiffened at attention. Jason gathered his and Layla's file and tossed them under the table before she could see what we were looking at.

Kandi started rattling on about perfection and her hopes for the breeding program. My thoughts were buzzing still. All I could think about was that I had to get to a computer. Fast.

* * *

_Subject: Nothing Itron needs to be concerned about so don't read if you're a white coat_

_Dear Flock, _

_Hey! It's Salem, Cat, and Taz. We've lost three members. There's only three of us now. We know where Eric is, but we have no idea where Tarzan and Kitten are. We heard from an almost reliable source that they might have been taken to another country to be trained as assassins. Like how Max, Ari, Angel, and Nudge almost got sent to China! Those white coats have no originality, honestly. If you have any ideas it would be much appreciated. _

_Sincerely,  
1/2 of the Pride_

* * *

_Subject: RE: Nothing Itron needs to be concerned about so don't read if you're a white coat._

_Dear 1/2 of the Pride,_

_It's us again. That's terrible. If we hear anything about a lion or kitten kid, we'll let you know. But honestly I don't know how likely that is. We've been split up before too. Don't worry. You always come back together. BTW, I thought you said that three of you were missing, but you only mentioned two. What happened to the other guy?_

_Fang and the Flock_

* * *

_Subject: RE:RE: Nothing Itron needs to be concerned about so don't read if you're a white coat._

_Dear Fang and Flock,_

_Cat says that's classified._

_Salem_

_P.S. **ARE YOU AND MAX OFFICIALLY BF AND GF?!?!?!?!?!?!**_

* * *

_Subject: RE: RE: RE: Nothing Itron needs to be concerned about so don't read if you're a white coat._

_Dear Salem,_

_Max says that's classified._

_Fang_

* * *

_Subject: THIS IS ERIC! READ IMMEDIATELY!_

_Hey guys! Okay, I don't have a lot of time to write this so I'll get to the important stuff. Cat, stop worrying about Jason wanting to screw you. He's your cousin! (EW!) Or at least that's what his file says. Your dad's sister is a donor in Salt Lake City. Here's something else, Jason and Layla are half brother and sister! (More EW!) Salem, I need you to look up everything you know on Dr. Larueax. He's a French white coat._

_P.S. Say hi to Taz for me._

* * *

**Tarzan's POV: **

One punch to the gut, another to the face. There's a pressure point right in the hip. I kicked it and the Eraser went down with a whimper. I looked over to Kitten instinctively. She had a cut on her lip. She wiped it with her arm and then smeared the blood on her gray jumpsuit. She looked back at me with a matching cold, distant look. It almost pained me to see her that way. She looked like a robot. Like I did whenever I looked in the mirror in our brand new Eraser suite she, Hunter, and I shared.

Hunter stood up from where he was. He'd been knocked down, but the Erasers around him were all tearing out each other's throats. Hunter had been given the time to meditate to fight like he needed to. The Erasers tore each other apart as we all headed toward the door that slid open.

"Hunter: 78 percent. Not bad, but we want you to not always rely on your mind to fight," Fang clone said. "Kitten: 88 percent. You were hit three times, but overall you took plenty Erasers out. Tarzan:..." Gasman peeked over at my results on the monitor and raised his eyebrows impressed. "100 percent. Congratulations. You're a natural born killer."

"Thank you, sir," I said appropriately.

* * *

Hey guys! The stories going great. I thought about making Jason Cat's brother, but I thought that would be too much like Max and Ari.

That's all for now. But there will be more later. You guys rock!

On a more personal note, I have a question. This is for people that just want something to read every once and a while, and like to read what I write, even if it's not necessarily fanfiction. How many of you all would visit my webpage if I made one for all my the stuff I've non fan fiction stuff I've been writing? I love to write and I really want to get people's feedback. The website would be free of course. I just want to be read.

Review back yes or no. I promise not to be offended by any honest criticism. If you want to see more samples of stuff I have that's not fanfiction check out my other story that's in the Twilight section called "Choosing Sides."


	47. Pieces of the Puzzle

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all these characters. Well, at least most of them.

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

Something felt strange about sleeping so easily in the School. Maybe it was because instead of a dog crate I was in a bed. Maybe it was knowing that Layla was just down the hall. Maybe I finally felt comfortable without worrying about Erasers crashing through the walls of killers with a personal grudge. How could school be the safest place I'd ever been? Now there is something wrong with that.

I convinced myself they probably drugged our food. A way for keeping Erasers at bay or something. What sort of chemical can give that homey chocolate chip cookie feeling? I don't know. But if it kept this up I was going to steal it, take it with me in the real world, and shoot it up through a syringe like a junkie.

That was at least until I heard a knock on my door. I swung my legs over my descent cot and walked over to the door. I couldn't help keeping my old habit of listening to the door with sensitve hearing. There was the ragged breathing of an Eraser of the other side. Any other time I would have been worried.

I opened the door and Layla burst in with only the smallest greeting. Then she started to pace.

"Are you okay?" I asked her carefully. She paced faster.

"No," she said. She spun on her heel and went on with another round of pacing. "I don't know."

"What's wrong?" I asked sitting down on the edge of the bed. Layla plopped down heavily beside me.

"I can't stop thinking. I mean, Jason and I alway suspected it. But we were never sure we were brother and sister. Do I look anything like him?" She whipped her head around to face me. I looked at her face a moment and shook my head.

"No," she said. "That's where you're wrong." She pulled back her hair. "See? We have identical ears!" I couldn't help but laugh. She smacked me lightly.

"It's not funny. I'm freaking out," Layla said folding her bare arms across her chest.

"I want to meet him," she said. "I want to meet Dr. Lareaux. Jason says he doesn't, but I know he does. He says he's having a hard enough time swallowing the fact that he's French. Well, so do I. I mean, do I look French to you?"

"No," I said honestly.

"Exactly! Because I look exactly like my mom," she said. "Except for the ears." Okay, let me remind you what I am. I am a fourteen year old kid who's never had any experience with girls outside of the Pride. Certainly I have no romantic experience.

"I think you have pretty ears," I blabbed out thoughtlessly. Pretty ears. That's the best I could come up with. She smiled and looked down shaking her head.

"You're sweet," she said patting my head like a puppy who'd at least attempted to perform a trick. "But I don't even know where to start looking for my dad."

"It will be okay, Layla," I said as gently as possible. I put my hand down on the bed, meaning to place it innocently on my sheets, but it landed just over Layla's hand. We looked at our hands for a moment. I looked away feeling the heat rise to my face. Layla had never been one to hide her emotions. She smiled openly.

And if case you were wondering, yes. This was the reason I asked Salem to look up Dr. Lareaux. It was just dumb luck that he also happened to be the exact guy we were looking for.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

"Cat?" Her voice sounded so far away. "Cat, are you okay?" Was I okay? I was lucky hadn't let the shock sink in until we were at a hotel. Taz was on the floor next to me playing with my shoe laces. I just stared at the TV across from me that was off.

"Cat!"

SLAP! The pain and after burn of the slap stung. I grabbed my cheek.

"Salem!" I shouted. Salem took a step back away from me.

"I'm sorry! I've seen people in movies do that," she said. "You were staring all droopy eyed. You were scaring me."

"Cat," Taz agreed toddling over to my lap. I took a deep breath.

"Jason isn't my cousin," I said. Salem shrugged. "This is all a trick. We should warn Eric. They know we're messing with the whitecoats and they're messing with us right back. We have to email Eric and tell him to come back as soon as possible."

"But he's doing such a great job," Salem said. She sat down next to me and opened her laptop which now had a bumper sticker from a vending machine across it labeled 'Sparky.' Oh geez, she's named it. She held it out in front of me. Her hand touched the screen and without even having to glance at the keyboard, the pages whizzed by my face and supersonic speed.

After a few pages and following a few stray links finally an article showed up. From 1988, of all times.

"This is an article from a newspaper. It's the latest news about him at all. I'm working on hacking into some personal information though, driver's license, birth certificates, its hard though since its all French," Salem said. I lowered the page.

"Jacque Lareaux recanted a proposal to the US Medical Board asking for permission to clone and breed animals after they discovered it was for military purposes," I read out loud.

"More specifically, he wanted to clone and breed cats," Salem clarified. "According to Dr. Kandi, there's only six cat mutants. Eric is with the Erasers. You and me are here. Even when they did capture Taz, he probably didn't want him because he's an Eraser."

"Boom!" Taz shouted inappropriately slamming his fists on the ground. I glanced down at him and held him still.

"So the chances that Tarzan and Kitten are with him..." I said as the wheels in my head were slowly turning.

"Are very good," finished the little computer genius of a twelve year old. "I'll start an email to Eric." She smiled coyly. "Or maybe I'll just email Dr. Kandi directly..." My eyes went wide. I looked over at the email she was writing. Man, that kid was good.

"Should I send it?"

"Maybe you should fix it a little bit. Make it sound a little less suspicious. No offense but it looks like a twelve year old wrote it," I said as delicately as possible. The letter disappeared from the screen. I blinked.

"Oops," Salem muttered.

"What happened?" I asked wildly scanning the screen.

"I accidently sent it without fixing it," Salem said biting her claw nervously. She turned toward me looking worried. "You don't think she'll notice something's wrong. Do you?"

God, I hoped not. But to be honest she was probably going to read that email and know it was a fake.

"No, no. I'm sure Eric will be fine," I lied professionally.

"Uh oh," Taz voiced from my side. That kid's like a psychic or something.

* * *

_Subject: Feline Experiments_

_Dear Dr. Kandi, _

_I've heard of the tiger genetic experiment in your clutches. I would like to see him immediately. I believe he may have some stuff I want to experiment him about. GTG, My escargot just arrived._

_Dr. Laraeux_

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

"I've gotten a strange request this morning," Dr. Kandi said pacing in front of me, Jason, Layla, and two other Erasers who's names escape me at the moment. (And its just as well. They aren't important.) This strange request Dr. She-Frankenstein is referring to woke us all up and five in the freakin' morning. I'm a cat! I need sleep!

So I was grumpy and nodding off. Every once in a while, Layla had to nudge me and I would jerk awake standing up straight.

"Apparently," Dr. Kandi said. "A fellow scientist over in France wants to observe our first ever, cat Eraser." All eyes turned to me. I fought the urge to smile and wave at everyone.

"So, Eric. You will go overseas to the address given accompanied by Jason, Layla, Muzz, and Dex," Dr. Kandi said. "He has a foundness for kitties. And I don't want him getting his hands on any more. So watch Eric carefully. All of you." The line of Erasers nodded. We all turned and headed toward the car that was waiting outside to take us to the airport.

I was too tired to notice Dr. Kandi's suspicious glare.

* * *

_Subject: ERIC! READ NOW!_

_Eric! How are you? We haven't heard from you. I'm so worried about you. You and Layla married yet? JK (I hope). This is Cat by the way. _

_Salem sent you the information about Lareaux. He's a cat scientist guy! Keyword, CAT. Tarzan and Kitten are most likely to be there than anywhere else. We've been trying to find him all day, but no luck. The dude just disappeared. If you know anything else about him, let us know. _

_Also, I have to warn you about the email Salem sent to Dr. Kandi. She found out how to hack into Lareaux's email and sent the email from his account. I don't know how, but you know how she is. Anyway, it wasn't very well written. I think Kandi might know something's up. Stay on your toes. If you don't feel safe run as soon as you get a chance or email us where you are so we can back you up. _

_BTW, Taz says hi. Salem's asleep, but I'm sure she says hi too._

_Love, Cat_

* * *

This is the email I got when I finally got to a computer at the airport. I drummed my fingers anxiously and looked around to make sure none of the Erasers watching. I'd told them I was going to the bathroom. I know its risky, but Dr. Kandi had given me an address to the french cat scientist guy, who just so happened to also be Layla and Jason's dad. 

I swear, our lives could be a soap opera.

So the reason I was being sent to Lareaux was because he was a cat scientist guy, who probably also had Tarzan and Kitten. Granted he hadn't dissected them or something yet.

I shivered at the thought.

Plus he was my girlfriend's dad. Nothing's ever easy, is it? I quickly replied to Cat and sent her the address to her.

"Eric!" Layla's voice came from far away. I'd been away too long. I quickly got off the public terminal and started to jog in her direction.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

"He got an address!" Salem shouted from the edge of the motel bed.

"Yes!" Taz said as though he understood. He ran to the edge of the bed and poked his head in front of the laptop. I grabbed him and pulled him into my lap.

"An address?" I echoed.

"Kandi's sending him to Dr. Lareaux as requested. He gave us the address. All we have to do is meet him there, get him, Tarzan, and kitten, and then get the hell out of there!" Salem said nearly squealing with excitement. I put a hand on her shoulder.

"You're not allowed to say 'hell' until you're fourteen, sweetie," I said. "How are we going to get to France?"

"I'll book it," Salem said. "After hacking into Lareaux's email I got his credit card number off of Amazon. This trip is on him and we're flying first class." I smiled and looked at her in disbelief. Can you even do that? Salem was already working on it. I guess you can.

"Okay," I said. "Here we go to France, I guess." Suddenly a thought occured to me. I spun around.

"We still have the Flock's email address?" I asked her. She nodded. "Email the Lareaux's address to the Flock. Tell them to meet us there. It's an emergency."

* * *

That's all for now.

I got an overwhelming response of two people who agreed I should make my own website! But hey, I like to write. So that's enough for me. I'll get to work on it, but to be honest I have no idea how to make a website. Anybody have any suggestions let me know, because I am clueless. I can't even run my own myspace.


	48. All Three with Matching Ears

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

Good news everyone! Well, its good for me. I'm not sure if you guys will care or not. My website is up and running! Need something to read? Review me asking for the link since I can't put any websites on fanfiction. I'll reply shortly and you can find more stories to watch develop.

Thank you guys who have supported be this far! You guys are the ones who have given me the confidence to actually put my writing online for all to see. I hope that if I do make it to the big time and start writing books you guys will be there going, "Hey! I read her when she was just writing fanfics!" But that's a big if...

I promise not to let you guys down with this fanfic.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

I was trying to look inconspicous in my first class seat as a girl wearing stolen clothes that hadn't been washed in literally weaks. I was holding Taz, my "little brother" who got to fly free. And Salem was the girl with the skin condition wearing a ski mask to hide her furry body. Normally this would upset her. But not today.

"We're going to meet the Flo-ock, we're going to meet the Flo-ock," she sang bouncing up and down. I put my hand on her knee. She stopped bouncing and sqealed excitedly.

"Chill. Out," I said soothingly. Salem was way beyond the point of self control.

Then the plane started to go. Salem clutched the armrests with extended claws ripping the leather.

"Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!" she said. Her grin was evident even through the ski mask. "I wonder if Fang's hot! I wonder if Max is pretty!" She gasped and covered her mouth. "I wonder if Nudge can show me anything I don't know about computers!" she whispered then grabbed my arm and shook it in her obsession induced high.

"This is going to be the best day of my life," she said.

"We're going to be breaking into a School, rescuing our pride members, trying not to get killed by Erasers," I reminded her. She stared dreamily at the seat in front of her.

"Yeah," she said. "But we're going to be doing it all with the Flock." Obsessed much? I shook my head and decided to change the subject.

"Has Eric emailed us back?" I asked her.

"No," Salem said irritated with being interrupted from a daydream she was playing in her head. I sighed and leaned back in my seat. I was going a little stir crazy completely cooped up in a flying metal box. Do you know how long it takes to get to freakin' France?

We got there armed with nothing, but a baby carrier strapped to chest. We stood there and waited.

"Sale? Did the Flock say they were going to meet us here?" I asked her. Salem shrugged.

"I don't know. I didn't get an email back," Salem said. I sighed.

"I thought you said we were going to meet them," I said irritated. Salem nodded confidently.

"Trust me. We are," she said. Taz shifted uncomfortably in the carrier strapped to my chest. He was getting kind of big and he barely fit in it. But we weren't exactly going to leave him with a french babysitter when he got sprouted fur and a snout. You know how fast that poor preschool would be conquered? (AN: Sorry. Couldn't resist one French joke. So don't get your fries and toast in a knot.) Taz would just have to come to the fight with us. And who knew? Maybe he could contribute. I've seen Taz at his worst before. He can do some damage.

"Eric!" Taz shouted wriggling as much as he could in the carrier.

"That's not fair! He says Eric's name before mine and he's not even here," Salem said. My eyes went wide as I followed Taz's gaze. Eric was actually here. Along with a great big gang of Erasers who had just gotten off the flight. The walked away from their gate like a bunch of secret agents on a mission.

What are the freakin' odds!? Well, considering our luck, I suppose the odds are pretty good.

Before I could even tell Salem what was going on I grabbed her by the scruff of her hoodie and pulled her with me as I hurried in the opposite direction.

"The Flock's going to have to wait. Eric's here. We need to get to the French Itron NOW," I said.

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

Wow. Taz had actually said my name. That's a new one for him. My sensitive ears caught the sound of Taz. I know that kid's voice. I lived with him for like...what? Three months now?

"What was that?" Layla said stopping in the middle of the airport and looking over her shoulder.

"Come on, Layla. We're gonna be late," Jason ordered leading the pack toward the taxi outside. She didn't seem to hear him. She stopped dead in her tracks and looked the other direction. In an act of desperosity, I grabbed her arm.

"Layla, hurry up," I said hoping to distract her. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a flash of blonde hair and dark clothing. Cat. Layla turned back around and looked at me. For a brief moment my eye caught her's. I tried to see if she knew what we were up to. They didn't reveal anything. Had she seen Cat? Did she know this was a setup? Was she going to hate me if she knew?

"Layla," Jason ordered sternly. She looked passed me at Jason.

"Yeah?"

"Hurry up! You're the one who wanted to meet Lareaux so bad," Jason said folding his arms impatiently. She nodded and shrugged my grip off her arm. She walked ahead of me and through the sliding glass doors outside. Lareaux had sent a town car. How very thoughtful. Erasers aren't very big on talking and its just as well because I was distracted with my own thoughts.

I worried about Tarzan and Kitten. Now I was worried that Layla might be wise to the whole reason I "betrayed" the pride and gave myself to the School. I was worried about all of us when we were just going to burst into Itron (that was more than likely filled to the brim with Erasers) to bust out our friends.

By the time I had filed all of my worries into neat little categories the town car was turning into a giant gray massive building. Of course we had to pass the iron gate surrounded with an electric fence, armed guards, and vehicle check points. It was standard procedure. Our School had all this too, but the one in America was hidden in the desert. This one was just outside of Paris.

It was going to be tough getting out. I hoped Cat had one of her stupid half-assed plans. At least I hoped she had a good one.

The doors opened and there at the doorway was Jason, tall and standing in his white coat beside a winged kid with sunglasses who wasn't quite making direct eye contact. Wait. No. It wasn't Jason. It must have been Dr. Lareaux. Jason and Layla looked just as stunned as I did looking at him.

"_Soyez bienvenus à Itron, le tigre. J'espère que vous ne vous battrez pas_," said the whitecoat. The tall winged kid took a step forward.

"Dr. Lareaux says welcome," he said only to me. Then behind me the Erasers started to transform into their beast forms. I panicked and turned to run. One nameless Eraser grabbed one arm, and Layla grabbed the other. When I looked at her she stared right back at me, her jaw clenched sternly and her eyes were unapologetic. "And he hopes you won't struggle."

They knew. They knew the whole time. They were leading me to France. Why? Then it dawned on me. Salem, Cat, and Taz. They were all on their way. They were trying to group us together for the cat-scientist, Dr. Lareaux.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said lamely. The bird kid sighed and shook his head.

"Take him to the testing room. Lock him there. We have a final test run on our team," the bird kid said to the Erasers. Jason took my arm in place of Layla. She backed away watching as I started to fight. I got a good kick in one of the Eraser's guts, but I was immediately obliged with a staggering punch in the face. "Be careful! We need him intact!" I couldn't believe this was happening.

"Layla! Layla do something!" I begged her. I wanted to see something that showed she really cared for me. That this whole thing wasn't just a trap.

"What do you want me to do?" she asked angrily.

"I don't know! Anything!" I shouted back at her as they were dragging me up the steps. She just watched me get taken away.

Layla waved twiddling her delicate little fingers.

"Bye," she mouthed to me barely audible. I kicked and screamed. Not another School! No way! I wasn't going through this whole crap hole again! Where was Cat? Where was Salem? Hello, aren't I part of the rescue team? How was it that I was being captured!?

* * *

Sorry this took so long. I got really into the whole website thing. There are currently five stories in the works on my site. And there are plenty more that still need downloading. If you want to check it out just review this page or send me a private message and I'll send it to you.

There will be more to this story soon enough. This time for sure.


	49. Unknowingly Aided

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

Okay, driving in France. Weird. Just plain weird. Tiny little cars, people riding bikes in your way. It was annoying as all hell. Not to mention Salem practically hanging out the window to point to things she'd only seen on the internet and telling me all the history behind it while I'm trying to drive.

Taz however thought it was hilarious every time I'd get so frustrated I'd have to brake hard.

"Bounjour? Get out of the way!" I said to the cyclist who was idling at a green light. "Salem, watch Taz. He's not in a carseat remember."

"Hey Cat! Did you know you're old enough to drink in this country?" Salem said plopping down. She looked out the window. "Hey! I think I see Angel! Wait, no... That's just a regular kid."

"Forget the Flock. We gave them the address. If they're coming at all they'll know where to find us," I said. We were so close. I could practically see the building on the hillside and there was a freakin' traffic jam! I could just imagine what I would say to the rest of the pride.

"_Sorry I wasn't here to save you from the mad scientists sooner, guys. Traffic was horrible!_" I took a moment to hit my head repeatedly on the steering wheel until traffic started moving. Finally! I sighed with relief and pressed down on the gas. It was a short drive to my surprise.

Finally Itron came into view. There was a large iron gate around it with an electronic keypad on the outside. I braked and let Salem lean over to simply touch it. With an approved beep the doors opened. It was all so... simple. Suddenly I braked. Too simple for me to not be paranoid.

"What's going on?" Salem asked.

"We're walking from here on out," I said. Salem had Taz in her lap. She handed him to me and I strapped him in the baby carrier on my back. "Kay, Taz. You're covering the rear."

"Dah," Taz agreed. Salem walked beside me as we followed the rest of the row next to the hows of trees that surrounded the place.

"So... Are we just going to walk up to the front door and knock? Sneak in through the side door?" Salem asked. I looked at her and smiled. I patted her head.

"Don't worry, Sale. I got a plan," I lied.

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

Jason and the other Eraser pushed me into the testing room which was just big and wide like an auditorium. I spun around just before Jason could leave.

"Hey!" I shouted. He stopped just long enough to look over his shoulder. "How can you do this? How can she do this?" Jason shrugged.

"Some things we're just meant for. You have to stop running away from it Eric," Jason said. With that he shut the door behind him. The lock activated and I was alone in the huge room. A voice came over the intercom.

"Team report," said the voice. I think it was the bird kid.

"Alpha, present."

"Beta, present."

"Charlie, present." I looked up at the ceiling as if the voices had come from God. The third voice. It sounded like a little kid. It sounded like...

The lights turned off. I couldn't see anything.

"Search and destroy." The doors opened and three silhouettes slinked into the darkness with me. I extended my claws and peered through the blackness trying to see the killers. Erasers? No. They were too quiet. Any normal Eraser would be taunting and growling by now. All I could hear with sensitive ears was controlled breathing and the padding of feet.

I did a three sixty and started to walk around. I wish I wasn't alone right now. I wish the pride was here. I wished Layla was here. Even if she did set me up. That was forgiveable. But the way she just watched me leave? That wasn't.

Meanwhile here I was being hunted in pure darkness. A roar erupted in the room. My hands instinctively shot over my ears. At that same moment I was tackled to the side, dragged to the ground. I was lucky enough to get knee the person in a soft place. From that point I could estimate where the face was. I elbowed them and rolled out from underneath them.

"Knock it off," I said hoping these people in the darkness could be talked to. "I don't want to fight. You don't have to do this." I heard the soft scuffle of feet in one direction. I moved to face that direction. Then was tackled by an immense weight behind me. I fell down on the concrete floor roughly and busted my chin in the process. Then suddenly the room flashed red. I could see.

The light blinked on and off. The person on top of me flipped me around. That's when I saw who it was. The huge, unshaven, almost caveman-like person with more strength than one person in one body should possess.

"Tarzan?" I question. Tarzan pulled back a punch not even responding to me. I held up my hands. "Tarzan! Hey man, its me! It's Eric!"

"Drop the target," bird kids yelled over the intercom. Tarzan let go of my shirt and let me drop roughly on the floor. He stepped back and stood between his two accomplices. Hunter and Kitten? What the hell was going on?

"You," I hissed at Hunter. "You're in their heads. You're making them do this!" Hunter didn't even blinked. The lights continued to flash red. It didn't even look like Hunter was there anymore.

"Team! We have an intrusion. Search and destroy," said the bird kid. All three of them moved from their stances at attention and jogged toward the door. The alarms could be heard from outside. Cat and Salem were here. But they had no idea they were about to be attacked by the same hostages we intended to rescue. I wiped my bloody chin on my chin. Up above there were cameras surrounding the room.

Then there was a window for the bird kids to look in. I stopped and looked up at them as they whispered to each other.

"Hey!" I shouted at them. None of them seemed to be listening. "HEY!"

CLICK

My ears perked. What was that?

CLICK

I looked in the room again. There were bird kids standing around talking. Did they not hear the clicks?

"Fire in the hole!" shouted someone completely unfamiliar to me. But one of you might recognize them.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

Digging under the fence to sneak in? Not one of my best ideas. Stupid motion sensors. Salem was handing Taz to me under the fence when we heard the alarms go off.

"Great," I muttered. "Either Eric's in trouble or we are."

"Or both," Salem said.

"Uh oh," Taz agreed. Smart baby. I took Salem's hand and helped her through the hole we'd dug. Salem brushed off her pants and took off her ski mask. Then the ground vibrated. We all heard the sound that came inside.

It was a very muffled BOOM!

An explosion. We all turned our heads in that direction and looked at one another.

"What was that?" Salem asked.

"I don't know," I said honestly.

"What do we do now?" Salem asked shaking out her black hair. I sighed.

"Well. We might as well barge in at this point," I muttered. "Where will be the easiest way to get into the building electronically speaking?" Salem shrugged.

"I don't know. A side door or something. Maybe something that's reserved for employees," she said. I ruffled her hair.

"Good thinking, Sale. Alright stay on your toes and hit the ground if you hear any gunshots. Those guards were armed," I said. Salem trotted close as soon as I mentioned weapons. As we snuck around the side of the building I couldn't help but think about how stupid I'd been. I was bringing a baby and a twelve year old to a fight. My fourteen year old was working as a spy right under their big hairy noses and I had no partner to tell me if my plans were stupid or not.

Did I have a choice? Would I have been better off doing this alone? No. I needed Salem for her powers. I even needed Taz who seemed to be suspiciously good at alerting us whenever something bad was going to happen. Suddenly Taz started to cry. I cringed as we were only a few steps away from the door.

"Taz!" I whispered. I took off the baby carrier. "Taz, no is not the time!" Salem sighed.

"Here. Let me take him," she said. I handed Taz to her. It didn't console him. That's when I was suddenly struck by a runaway freight train. Or at least that's what it felt like. Really it was Tarzan who'd somehow snuck up behind and tackled me at full speed.

Luckily my claws caught into his jumpsuit and I brought him down with me.

Then our fight paused as I suddenly realized that this was Tarzan. Tarzan was right here! Right with me! I was so stunned and relieved I didn't care if he'd just thrown me to ground with as much force as a semi.

"Tarzan?" I breathed looking up at him. He blinked. Then he raised his arm to pull back a punch. Suddenly it dawned on me. He was attacking. I gasped and held up my hands defensively. "Tarzan! No!"

* * *

More to come very soon. I promise! I'm working on it right now! 

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form.

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com


	50. Putting Hunter to Sleep & Waking Kitten

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

His fist came down to land the blow. I rolled out of the way just in time.

"Cat!" Salem cried. Out of the corner of my eye I saw one of Kitten's flying leaps. Hunter was right there with her. Hunter? They were working with the kid who tried to kill me? What was going on! I tried to get out from sparring with Tarzan, but every time I saw an opening he dragged me back in the fight.

"Tarzan! Stop it!" I demanded dodging a blow. I was faster than him, but every time he landed a blow I was staggered with shock. Slowed down, it wasn't hard to pummel me. Tarzan landed a kick in my stomach. I flew backwards about three yards. I looked up to see Tarzan coming at me once more. They'd turned against me. The School had turned my own pride on each other. The pride that I had worked damn hard to piece together from hopelessness! The pride that I had taught to talk! The time we put in listening to Eric tell us all he knew about the real world! The rescues! The escapes! The discovery of our powers!

Suddenly I wasn't just sad that my pride had been ripped at the seems. I was pissed.

"That's IT!" I cried jumping to my feet. I back peddled as Tarzan grew closer. "Salem!"

"Yeah," Salem answered with Taz in her arms as she backed away from Hunter and Kitten.

"There's something wrong with them. Wake them up. I don't care how, but we're not losing them this easily," I said.

"What? How?" Salem shrieked. I didn't answer her. I crouched down on all fours relying on my animal instincts I knew were somewhere inside and bared my teeth.

* * *

**Salem's POV:**

Wake them up? From what? How were they being controlled? Was it Hunter? No, it couldn't be. He had the same blank stare as Kitten and Tarzan. He was being controlled too. Taz squirmed uncontrollably in my arms. He was transforming for battle. His snout jutted out of his head. Fur started to sprout from his arms. He burst from the fabric of the baby carrier that he was already too big for.

He stood by my side like a true member of the pride. Suddenly Kitten jumped at my neck. Her hands went to my throat lost in my fur. I grabbed her throat instinctively, but she seemed to have a warm collar around her neck. I threw her aside just as Hunter had tackled me from behind. Taz took this moment to jump onto Kitten and cling onto her.

Hunter and I fought hand to hand. I used the moves Cat had taught us long ago in our first house. Kicking and punching, dodging and dancing. But Hunter had learned some moves of his own since we last met. All I could think was, "_What would the Flock do?_"

I jumped at his collar and knocked him down. His collar was warm too, I realized. Why did they have warm collars. I caught a glimpse of a little green light on the collar. It was electric! Without thinking I touched it and gave the device an extra jolt of electricity.

A shock jolted through my system sending me flying backwards. Hunter was on the ground spasming unable to escape the electrical current. His chest rose and his legs twitched like every nerve in his body was being activated. Smoke rose from the collar and his neck as he screamed out loud. He flopped on his stomach. All I could do was stare. Then suddenly his body stopped moving. Completely. No breathing.

I walked up to him after a tense moment and lifted up his head. It was clear from the distraught look frozen on his face. Not mention the eyes. Ew! His eyes! To put it as nondisgusting as possible, they no more than fried pieces in the eye sockets of his head. There was no doubt about it.

I'd accidently killed Hunter.

I didn't have time to be horrified with myself as I definitely would later.

Taz screamed. I picked myself up from beside Hunter's body. Taz was just a puppy and Kitten was going too hard on him. It was like she actually wanted to kill him!

"Kitten! Stop!" I shouted joining the fight. I jumped on Kitten and pinned her arms down. The only advantage I had was that I was bigger than her. After all, she's only eight. Without Tarzan to help her she was stuck under me. Taz leapt aside and growled ready to fight as needed.

"Kitten!" I cried. She squirmed beneath me twisting and biting. I had to make her stop. But how? If I activated the shock collar on her neck I'd kill her too.

"I'm a tool of Itron!" she shouted like a warcry and then spit in my face. I cringed but let it sit there since I was busy holding her down.

"Kitten! Can you hear me? It's me. Salem," I said. I realized that I was crying now. I sniffed. I pushed my brain to think harder. But there was nothing my powers could do to help me now. This was my pride member. She were practically sisters! I remembered telling her stories I'd read on the internet about the Flock, sharing our fries from McDonalds, sitting in front of the TV with her...

Wait! That was it!" I started to sing.

"

Suddenly Kitten stopped. She stared back up at me with big green eyes. But she didn't say anything. I smiled and continued.

"_Come and play  
Everything's A-OK  
Friendly neighbors there  
That's where we meet_"

I was quiet. I was waiting for a reaction from her, but all she did was stare at me. I opened my mouth to finish the song, but Kitten beat me to the next her.

"_Can you tell me how to get  
How to get to Sesame Street_" Kitten finished. I blinked and giggled uncontrollably.

"Kitten? Are you okay?" I asked through my joyful sobs. She looked confused. Like her whole way of thinking had just been shattered and glued back together.

"Salem? You came!" She started to cry too. We reached for each other and hugged. "I knew you would," she whispered.

* * *

For those who are confused, that was the Sesame Street theme song. I also don't own Sesame Street I think I should mention. More to come in about an hour or so.

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form.

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com


	51. Waking Tarzan

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

I dedicate this chapter to lexicuti4eva. The poor girl has waited long enough for this chapter.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

"Oof!" I fell on my tail and rolled backwards flipping over the ground, nearly breaking my neck. When I finally stopped rolling and flipping over the ground I was about a hundred feet away. I'd never known how strong Tarzan actually was, I guess. Then again, he's never thrown me before so how could I know? I looked up and saw Kitten and Salem hugging. Taz was beside them, his head cocked curiously across the battlefield we'd made of the side of the Itron building.

We were making a lot of commotion. That was for sure. The Erasers seemed to have been watching from afar the whole time. Most of them I didn't recognize. But Layla and Jason were in the crowd too watching our pride go one on one with ourselves.

Whitecoats watched from the safety behind their guardian Erasers. I could hear half of the Erasers inside the building trying to deal with the mysterious explosion inside.

"Tarzan," I said gasping for breath. He walked toward me ready to finish me off. I slowly pulled myself to my feet. "You gotta fight whatever has a hold of you. Look, Kitten's better. She can fight it. So can you."

"Deserters will be shot on side," Tarzan said like a robot.

"So what? It's not like you've never been shot at before," I said with a scoff.

"Cat! You have to do something to remind him of who he was!" Kitten yelled from across the battlefield.

"Like what?" I shouted back at her.

"I don't know," Kitten said. I sighed. That's _really_ helpful.

"Um, Tarzan remember when I jumped off a building? Remember the way you chased me the whole way there and left Taz at home and Taz ate all the furniture?" He was still coming toward me. Closer and closer. I walked backwards, but I was only inching toward the wall of the building. "Remember when we tried to go to Canada? Remember Sesame Street? Remember rotisserie chicken? Don't you remember when Eric and I nearly killed each other and you broke it up and yelled at us?"

I couldn't believe this. Tarzan was coming closer and closer. I gasped as I hit the wall of the Itron building.

"Finish her quickly! The fire department is coming!" a whitecoat shouted with a thick French accent. The explosion. Eric was still inside! Tarzan was going to kill me! I had tried to make a pride and everything was going terribly, terribly wrong. I wanted to cry, but I couldn't in front of all these Erasers and whitecoats. So I just stood there.

"Salem, Kitten, take Taz and run!" I yelled my eyes never leaving Tarzan's as the killer crept closer.

"What? We can't do that!"

"Just do it!"

"Alpha! Destroy the target quickly and meet at the rendevous point!" I couldn't see who was yelling. But all the Erasers and whitecoats were getting the hell out of there before the fire department arrived. My shoulders slumped in defeat. What did anything matter anymore? I did a quick look and saw that Salem, Kitten, and Taz had abandoned me as I ordered.

So now that I'd gotten half of the pride to safety. Did I have any regrets? Yes. I regretted that I couldn't save Tarzan like he saved me. I regretted that I'd never told him that he looked like Prince Charming every time he shaved.

And like I said, what did it matter anymore?

"T-Tarzan," I stammered. I couldn't control my shaking. I couldn't get the words out. Maybe I'd never get the chance to tell him. He still looked like he wanted to kill me. He was still coming towards me.

He wasn't waking up. Tarzan started to charge. Backed up against a wall, I had nothing to lose. I charged right back at him. This surprised him and made him skid to a stop. He tried to defend himself, but I was too fast. Before he could punch me one last time I clasped my arms around his neck and kissed him.

It was an awkward kiss since I was the only one kissing, but it did stop Tarzan from attacking me. He stood frozen in his stance eyes wide. I was half afraid to let go of him for fear that he would just jump right back at me and kill me. But I did because you can only kiss someone for so long.

I pulled away and jumped backward ready to defend myself just in case. But he just stood there. I couldn't find the words to say anything. Luckily, Tarzan filled the silence.

"You kissed me," he stated obviously.

"Yeah," I said awkwardly. "I had to. You were going to kill me."

"Oh," Tarzan said as if suddenly realizing this. "I was. Cat, I thought you'd never show up."

"Sorry I'm late. Traffic in France sucks. Are you okay now?" I asked. He nodded.

"I think so," he said slowly.

"Good. Now come on. We have to get Eric. He's still inside!" I said. I grabbed his hand and pulled him toward the burning building.

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

Curious about the mysterious explosion?

Well so was I. One minute I'm staring at the window where all the evil bird kids (who upon later inspection turned out to be clones of the Flock), the next the entire wall was crumbling down. The test room was obliterated to smitherings! I only had time to shield my face before I realized what was going on. I flew backwards with the shockwave all the way across the room and into the opposite wall.

The room where the clones had been watching me? Gone. What happened to those clones? Well, I could tell from the smell in the air that either they were blown to bits or someone was making barbecue chicken. As gross as that is, its true.

The fire alarms went off, but this explosion set off more down the halls in the labs. The entire building shook. Walls cracked and the smoke was clouding everything. The whole Itron building was coming down all around us.

"Well, I didn't know it was going to set off a chain reaction!" someone said in the smoke. I ducked beneath the cloud of smoke. My ears were still ringing louder than the talking.

"Well you should've! It was your bomb!" another person yelled. I coughed and waved my hand trying to get a look. I only saw enough to make out two non-clone winged silhouttes behind the wall of flames.

* * *

I'll give you three guesses of who these two mysterious people are. I'll give you a hint. I don't own either of them!

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form.

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com


	52. A Matter of Flock

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

This chapter is dedicated to everyone who has been riding me to put the Flock in here. You guys are very patient. I just hope I don't mess them up for you.

* * *

**Salem's POV:**

I had Taz's hand in one hand and Kitten's in the other. I sniffled the whole way as we walked away from the burning building. Tarzan? Cat? Eric? Was it possibly we'd lost them all? Hunter was dead for sure and I don't think he deserved it. We stopped a safe distance away from the building. Fire engines were roaring in the distance. I plopped down on my butt and hugged my knees to cry. Kitten sat down right beside me and clung to my arm leaning her head on my shoulder.

Taz sat down on my other side mimicking Kitten and holding on to my other side. What if I had to be the leader of the pride now? I wasn't ready. I wasn't even as old as Max, Fang, and Iggy.

"You think they got out okay?" Kitten asked. What would Cat do? She'd lie.

"Yeah," I said wiping my own tears.

"Hey!" said a new voice. Kitten's ears twitched toward the sound of flapping wings. Two bird kids plopped down gracefully through the trees right in front of us. My heart stopped. I knew instantly who they were. "You're Salem right?"

One was slightly darker than the other, her tangled hair was a mess. Her wings spotted like a falcon's. The other girl was significantly younger. Her hair was bright blonde and her wings were flawlessly white. I stood up quickly.

"Y-Yes," I stammered.

"Hi! I'm Nudge and this is Angel. Max told us to go find you since it looked like you guys were splitting up," Nudge said. Kitten jumped to her feet beside me. Taz bared his teeth ready to charge. I grabbed him quickly and tapped his nose the way Cat did.

I'd always wondered what I would do when I finally met the Flock. Now they were here and all I could do was stand there.

"Well," Nudge said. "Come on! Gazzy and Iggy are in the middle of blowing up Itron." She turned her back to lead the way out.

"What!" I yelped. "No! Eric's still in there!" Nudge quickly turned to Angel. They exchanged worried glances.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

We were halfway to inside the building when I felt someone grab my arm and pull me out. Suddenly there were about three more explosions inside. Fire crackled. Tarzan jumped out after me. When I looked up to see who was pulling on me I looked up to see brown eyes. Tarzan stopped beside me.

There was a blonde girl with wings and a dark haired boy with wings beside her.

"Max?" I questioned immediately.

"Yeah. And you're crazier than I am if you're going to run into a burning building," she said. Suddenly Tarzan glanced at the quiet dark haired boy. They looked at one another for a tense moment. And then he punched him. Fang (the _real_ Fang) tumbled backwards down the steps.

"Wait! Stop!" Kitten came running up to the building with Salem and Taz. I was relieved to see them all. "He's real! He's not a clone!"

"Oops," Tarzan said. I rolled my eyes and slapped my forehead in embarrassment. Max went to go help up her fellow flock member. Fang frowned and recovered quickly rubbing his chin. Hello? Can we please focus at the situation at hand?

"Eric's still inside!" I shouted of the roar of the flames as the building creaked and groaned.

"So are Gazzy and Iggy," Max said. Another explosion went off. "And it doesn't sound like things are going as planned."

"I'm going in there after him," I said. I started for the doorway when two flaming beams dropped down right in front of me making me come to a screeching halt. Tarzan grabbed my arm and pulled me away. The entire front half of the building was glowing with embers. Orange flickers broke off and floated into the sky. We all backed away as hot chunks of Itron fell to the ground.

"Don't worry," Max said swallowing hard. "Everything will be fine. They'll make it out okay." I looked at her and immediately recognized the confident face she put on and the worry in her eyes. She was lying to me the same way I lied whenever I had to comfort the pride.

* * *

**Eric's POV:**

Smoke clouded every room. I waved my hand in front of my face to get a better look at the two winged silhouettes. The smaller blonde winged boy looked around. The taller one with dark hair stared straight ahead.

"Hey!" I shouted over the flames.

"That kid has stripes! It's one of the cats!" Gazzy said.

"Come on! We've got to get the hell out of here!" Iggy said. Problem was there was a burning wall of fire in between us.

"How do I get over there?" I shouted struggling to see them through the line of fire in between us.

"I don't know. Jump?" Whenever the answer to something is 'I don't know. Jump?' It's never a good idea. But in this case. It was the only idea. I walked backwards as far as I could. Then sprinted at the wall and leapt over with my arms shielding my face. Flames leapt up and around me. I felt my clothes catch fire.

Iggy grabbed me in midair (he's blind, I don't know how he did this) and he and Gazzy started to pat out my clothes. The floor creaked and jolted. The floorboards were snapping right out from under us. We backed away toward the wall. Trapped between a crumbling floor and a wall. Granted a wall with the window.

"Any possible exits?" Iggy asked.

I looked at the window.

"Yeah. Just one," I said. Gazzy saw what I was looking at.

"Perfect!" he shouted. He turned and raised his foot on the glass. I turned around and helped him. Iggy heard the commotion and joined us.

"One! Two! Three!" We banged on the glass. My entire body felt terrible. Like I was still on fire. My lungs burned with smoke inhalation. But I couldn't be worried about that now. "One! Two! Three!"

The window crashed. Smoke leaked out of the room hurriedly.

"Now what?" I asked looking down at the three story drop. "Jump?" Iggy and Gazzy paused for a moment of silent comfirmation. Each of them took my arms. How they were planning on actually carrying another person with them I have no idea. But I guess desperate times calls for desperate measures.

"Up and away!" And they jumped with me each of them holding onto my arms. Do any of you readers know about weight ratios? Anybody seen Monty Python and the Holy Grail? If a swallow can't carry a coconut, two bird kids can't carry a tiger kid! Granted we did glide a little bit, but then we all fell like rocks.

* * *

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form. 

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com


	53. Cat's Don't Always Land on Their Feet

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

This chapter is dedicated to KiraXMomo. She is awesome and is helping me update my site so its not so lame. All hail Kira!

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

There was a sickening thump as Eric hit the ground. Iggy and Gazzy hit the ground a lot lighter. They were experienced at falling from tall heights. We all ran over to them. Iggy and Gazzy were staggering a little, but they were okay for the most part. Eric on the other hand was face down on the ground.

"Eric!" Tarzan and I ran to each side. We rolled him over onto his back. I felt my eyes widen.

Eric was burned. His sleeves were completely scorched. His arms that had been raised up to protect his face were wet and red with second and third degree burns. He clenched his teeth in pain. At least he was still awake.

"Eric?" I said. I felt an overwhelming motherly/sisterly instinct and brushed his hair out of his sweaty face. Eric looked up through squinted eyes.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Just... peachy," he gasped. I laughed a little. Tarzan picked him up. The fire engines were pulling up to the building now.

"We have to get outta here," Fang said. Oh. So he does talk.

"They're in no condition to fight. Come on guys. U and A. We'll lead off any Erasers who might be curious to find survivors," Max ordered. She clapped her hands twice and every last one of them opened their wings. Geez, I wish I had that kind of respect.

"Will we meet again?" Kitten asked. Max looked at Fang.

"I'll email Salem when the heat's off," he said. I nodded. We said good byes and then hurried to get out of sight. Tarzan held onto Eric while I rounded up the rest of gang. We were silent even after we were in the clear. We wandered off into the countryside and finally found ourselves a place to rest in a small clearing.

None of us were in good shape. I was still pretty beaten up from Tarzan and my encounter. Taz was fine. Kitten was relieved. She clung to me and I couldn't pry her off even if I had a crow bar. Not that I would want to. I'd missed that little kid so much.

Taz was happily jumping all over Tarzan, who tolerated him with little protest. I looked at him from across the campfire. He smiled knowingly at me. I tried to resist the smirk I had. We let Eric rest. He fell asleep easily and neither of us could bring ourselves to wake him up. It was obviously in a lot of pain. None of us wanted to take him to the hospital, but we were readying ourselves if we had to.

His arms were badly burned. The black striped designs on them were smeared with the burns. Now they looked more like black smudges. And Salem? Salem was quiet. She didn't even attempt to touch her computer. Something was terribly. Terribly wrong.

"Sale," I said. I patted the ground beside me motioning for her to sit next to me. She looked at me with sad yellow eyes. "You okay?"

She shook her head.

"What's wrong?"

"Hey," Tarzan said suddenly perking up. "What ever happened to Hunter?"

Salem bowed her head. She scrunched her body up into a ball and cried into her arms. I moved a little bit, motioning for Kitten to let go of me. She pleaded with her eyes for a moment. I gave her a warning look, letting her know that Salem needed me more than her right now. She sighed and let go, then crossed the fire to go cling onto Tarzan. I sat beside Salem.

"I killed him," Salem sobbed. She shook her head as she rocked to herself. "It was an accident."

"What?"

"The electrical collar. I only meant to deactivate it, but..." Tarzan sighed from where he sat.

"The whitecoats rigged it," Tarzan said. "It would have done that if you tried to touch any of our collars." He tugged on the one on his neck. "We still have to figure out how to get them off."

"Yeah," Kitten agreed.

"But I killed him," Salem said dragging us all back to the point. "And even if he was a complete nutjob..."

"He wasn't too crazy," Tarzan said. Kitten nodded in agreement. "He just wasn't as lucky as we were." I glared at Tarzan and gave him a 'you're-not-helping' look. Salem collapsed into her arms again.

"Where did you kill him?" I asked her as gently as I could as I reached my arm around her shoulders to hug her sideways.

"Next to Itron. Where we were all fighting. You and Tarzan. And Taz and Kitten," she said. I looked over at Tarzan. He shrugged. Salem sniffed. "Didn't you see the body? He was face down on the ground."

"I saw him on the ground. But then he wasn't there," Kitten said. "I didn't know you killed him. I just thought he got up and ran away." Salem blinked in confusion. She looked at each one of us.

"No, but I saw him. His eyes, they were..." she said. She wracked her braind as she thought.

"I don't remember seeing a body," I said. "I saw you take him out. But there was no body when we left."

"Maybe the whitecoats cleared it. They wouldn't want to leave a dead mutated kid on their property when the authorities arrived. It's bad publicity," Tarzan said.

"Or maybe he's still alive," Kitten said. Salem's brow furrowed.

"But... No one could have survived that shock," Salem said. We all looked at one another. Salem sighed. I don't know if she was worried or relieved. I hugged her again.

"Well," I said interrupting everyone's thoughts. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, mission accomplished. We got Eric back. Tarzan and Kitten are back. We met the Flock who's off getting the Erasers off our tails and we're going to meet them later. Sounds like a good day to me." One by one everyone agreed. I looked over at Eric who was currently the only one on my people-to-worry-about list. Yes, I have an actual list.

He slept soundly. So we all took turns watching and sleeping. And for once, we got through an entire night without being pounced on in the middle of nowhere.

* * *

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form.

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com

It has plenty more stories written by me. I'm thinking about offering to put anyone's other stories on it too. So if you're interested or you're just bored and you want to read check it out.


	54. Ghosts

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

Wow, I had no idea how many people liked Hunter. Hehehe...

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

I was the first to wake up, completely embarrassed because I must have fallen asleep on my shift. But it was almost worth it to see my entire pride all curled up around the dead fire. I took Kitten gently out of my lap where she had fallen asleep and set her on the ground. She shifted slightly.

I walked over to Eric and looked down at him. His arms still looked pretty bad. The skin on his arms were definitely dead, but it looked like it was peeling like a sunburn. Thank God for the speedy healing the whitecoats injected in all us freaks.

"He's fine," said Tarzan. "I already checked up on him." I smiled guiltily as he cocked an eyebrow at me. "Did you sleep well on your shift?"

"I'm sorry okay. I was just tired. I hadn't slept very well since you and Kitten disappeared," I said quietly. I sat next to him. Taz was curled up in his lap comfortably. I smiled. The relief was overwhelming, knowing everyone was back and safe. I looked back up at Tarzan. He looked back at me.

Awkward. Oh yeah... I had kissed him hadn't I? I had to break the awkwardness.

"You gotta shave, mountain man," I said gripping his hairy chin with a beard that was growing back.

"I know," he said.

More awkwardness.

"I'm so glad you're back," I whispered. He smiled a little. "I can't run this pride by myself. I need you." How I thought this would make the awkwardness, I'm not sure. But he nodded and put his arm around me.

"If it makes you feel better, we'll make a new rule. No more fairs," he said. "And definitely no more ferris wheels."

"I don't know. It was kind of fun until it broke and we all got captured and stuff," said Kitten making her way over to us. She plopped down beside me again and held on tight.

"I don't care how fun it was. No more ferris wheels," Tarzan said sternly. Kitten sighed.

"Fine."

* * *

**Salem's POV:**

_Salem._

My eyes opened.

_Salem._

I looked around the room that I was in. It was a small room. There was a couch just beyond the french doors. I could see a bathroom just down the hallway. I was standing in a bedroom with a few paintings and a king size bed. I gently took a step on the perfect pattern carpet. My shoes sunk into the bristles.

I caught a glimpse in the mirror. My eyes went wide.

Okay, I'm weird looking. I know that. I'm completely covered in black fur. I have the yellow eyes of a cat, and normal long human hair. I was used to my appearance and having to hide myself wherever I went. But looking in the mirror now? That was the most terrified I've ever been.

Instead of black fur, I had tan skin. My eyes were a normal hazel color. My hair was still black and as long as it normally was. But I looked...human. I touched my face. My fingers were still furry. I still had claws underneath my fingernails.

"Salem," said the voice again. Only this time it wasn't just in my head.

On the bed was a boy who was about my age. He had short cut hair that was as black as mine. He rested his hands on his chest clasped together and laced. There was white gauze around his eyes. His throat had a collar on it. For a moment he looked dead.

Then the corners of his mouth raised in a smile. He looked familiar, but he was lacking tell tale spots and a creepy look in his eyes that I'd always identified him by.

"Hunter?" I said.

"Come on, Salem. Up and at 'em," said a voice. I opened my eyes and found myself asleep on the ground by the fire. Right where I'd last left myself. Cat stood over me with a gentle hand on my shoulder. She smiled her motherly smile at me. I tried to receive it as gently as I could, faking a smile right back at her.

"We're going into town today. You need to recharge your laptop?" she asked. I nodded and sat up. I shook my head to recover from my own dream. But the picture stayed in my head like a memory that just wouldn't let me be. Yes, we were going into town today. Tarzan and Kitten still had their collars around their necks, and they needed to get it off. Since we didn't want to risk me trying to deactivate another collar we had to go into the little town neighboring town that was something French that I couldn't pronouce to meet a blacksmith.

The trip there was uneventful. We walked the whole way there since it wasn't too far and we were staying in one place for too long to steal a car. I don't know what I'd do if I had to meet the people who's cars we highjacked.

Pretty soon Kitten was having a pleasant conversation with a French blacksmith as he was prying off her collar.

"Hey, Cat. Mr. Napoleon wants to know how we got these collars on us," Kitten said. Cat looked up from the magazine she was looking at and glanced over at Tarzan.

"Tell him we were messing around with our dad's stuff in the garage," Tarzan said. Cat agreed with a nod. Kitten told him and the man laughed and said something only Kitten could understand.

I plugged my laptop into the wall and waited for the computer to load up. Computers take sooo long. I grumbled impatiently and put my hand on the side of the screen willing it to load faster. It did and then I was looking at the desktop on the screen. I signed into my email.

As expected, I had a letter from Fang. I smiled to myself. It was still freakin' awesome that I actually got to _talk_ to Fang whenever I wanted.

_Hey Pride, _

_We shook the Erasers. Just wondering how you guys are doing. Total was mad at us for leaving him behind to meet you. So just so you know, he says hi. There's more Itrons popping up all over the map. I'm letting the kids know about it in my blog right now. Maybe we can start another riot. We're heading over to Australia right now to check that one out. We heard about some more escaped experiments. It could be a rumor. But then again, we weren't sure if you guys were the real deal or not either. You're welcome to join us. _

_The Flock_

I showed Cat the email. She bit her lip in thought. Take on another Itron? She took my laptop quietly as if maybe the blacksmith working on Kitten's collar could understand us and showed it to Tarzan. Beside him, Tarzan leaned over for Eric to see too. He looked at the screen.

"Are we really in any shape to get another one?" he asked quietly. They looked at me. I shrugged.

"You guys are the leaders," I said. Tarzan and Cat looked at one another. Slowly Cat shook her head. Tarzan agreed. Cat handed me back the laptop.

"Tell them we need some time to recover. I think we should head back to America for a while," she whispered. I gave a mental sigh of relief. I wasn't really up for trailing those whitecoats again and getting recaptured.

I typed the email and sent it. The moment I clicked send, the metal collar fell off Kitten's neck and clanged onto the floor.

"_Ah! Fini!_" the blacksmith cried in victory.

"Yay!" Eric said with mock enthusiasm. He looked to Tarzan. "Can we go now?"

"Definitely," he said. Eric got up and winced slightly with the burns on his arms. Kitten hopped down and gave the man a hug saying something delightful in French that he laughed at. He looked at us expectingly. I handed him Mr. Lareaux's debit card.

"Keep the change," I said. Then we ran out of there as fast as we could.

* * *

Its a bit of a filler, but I'm having a hard time coming up with more ideas. I think I may have one though which is why I gave Salem a dream sequence.

Check out my website! It's growing like crazy.

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form.

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com

It has plenty more stories written by me. I'm also offering to put anyone's other stories on it too. So if you're interested or you're just bored and you want to read check it out.


	55. There's No Escaping the Madness

I don't own Maximum Ride. I do own all my characters.

* * *

**Salem's POV:**

This time I was on the floor looking down at the cheap hotel carpet. In the reflection in the french windows I saw my reflection the same way. I had tan skin, hazel eyes and a furless body. My hair was draped straight down either side of my face like curtains. I moved my hand in front of me. When I looked down I looked like I did in real life. I had fur and claws, like always.

_Salem. _I stood up straight. Once again that boy was lying across the hotel bed, gauze tied around his eyes.

"Hunter, are you alive?" I whispered. The boy only smiled.

"More or less," he responded. More or less? You'd think that was a kind of a yes or no question. "Yes, I suppose technically," he said as if reading my thoughts.

"Is this a dream?" I said.

"Technically," he said again. I sat on the edge of the bed close to him. I looked at him lying there. Those bandages across his eyes. His spotless face.

"What are you doing in my head?" I asked him. He didn't answer for a while. I looked at his outstretched body across the bed. I started to reach for his foot to give him some sort of comfort. He jerked his foot away from me quickly.

"Don't touch me," he said quickly. I pulled my hand back just as fast. Then I huffed. I was getting agitated.

"This is the second time you've shown up in my dreams. You're alive, I get it. I'm sorry I almost killed you. It was an accident. You have to believe me," I said.

"I know, Salem. Don't worry about it," Hunter said shaking his head slowly.

"Well, are you going to drive me crazy like you did to Cat?" I asked him harshly.

"No," Hunter responded.

"Then get out of my head!" I shouted, frustrated.

"I can't," he said.

"Why not?" I asked.

"Because you're going to need me later," Hunter said.

* * *

"Salem?" Cat's voice said. I woke with a start as Cat shook my shoulder. I shot up in my seat automatically pushing my hood down. Cat grabbed the fabric and pulled it back over my head. I rubbed my eyes and groaned irritated. We were on a plane, I remember now. We were heading back to America. Fang had emailed us an address to an abandoned cabin they had used once, though he also said he didn't think it was a good idea to stay there. It was never a good idea to stay in the same place twice... blah, blah, blah. 

Well you know what? Hideouts are hard to come by and though the Flock might be okay camping in the middle of nowhere, the Pride had no nature survival skills whatsoever.

"Sale?"

"Yeah?" I said with a yawn.

"The stewardess came by. She asked if you wanted steak or fish. I said steak. Is that okay?" she asked. I nodded and leaned against the window. Clouds floated by carelessly as we zipped through them.

"Actually, the proper term is flight attendant," Kitten said in the row behind us. I yawned and looked out the window. At least we were over land now. Flying over the water was making me uncomfortable. With that I felt my eyes close.

_Salem, come back._

The last thing I felt was my head fall back against the cushioned head rest.

* * *

Back to the hotel room with Hunter lying flat on the bed facing up, but not necessarily looking.

"How did you-?"

"Consciousness is a fragile state of mind. You weren't doing anything important anyway. Unless your stake is more important than what Itron is planning," Hunter said casually. I opened my mouth protest that actually my steak was very important, but I caught myself. "Yup, Itron has a new plan."

"Okaaaaay," I said gently. "And what might this whole new plan be?"

The fellow feline paused.

"I'm not sure yet," he admitted. "But its something. I need to stay in touch with you, okay?"

"No. Not okay! Put me back to sleep when you have something important to tell me!" I cried frustrated.

* * *

My eyes snapped open as the rush of gravity pushed me against the seat. I looked out the window. Land rushed passed at a remarkable speed. I watched the trees and cars go by in a blur. Cat was leaning over the seat saying something to Tarzan who was consoling a fussy Taz in his lap.

I wondered if I should tell them about my encounter.

Maybe not. After all, I'd seen Hunter dead. There was no way he could be alive, let alone in my head. Though it admittedly wouldn't be too much of a stretch if he was. One by one we hurried out of our seats as fast as we could. After all, we had no carry-ons like everyone else on this plain. Except for Taz's diaper bag of course, but Cat had that strapped firmly across her chest. She took Kitten's hand with her free hand.

Eric nodded for me to hurry up and then ushered me in front of him. I felt some sort of relief as my pride walked out into the forest thick land in front of us. Of course Hunter wasn't inside my head. Everything was finally fine. For once. Why blow the moment of peace we definitely deserved over something as silly as a dream? This was our chance to have a house, to try to be normal again. Maybe even we could be a real family this time. Maybe Itron would be out of our lives for good.

I snorted at the thought.

_Yeah...suuuure. _

Hunter apparently agreed with my disbelief.

* * *

Yay! I know! I know! I haven't added in forever. Sorry. Bad Ariana. I've been busier than hell. Adding to stories on my website and what not. Working, vacationing, getting sunburn. I'll try to update more.

Check out my website! It's growing like crazy.

And for those who are curious this is my website sort of. The link won't come up on fanfiction so here it is in word form.

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com

It has plenty more stories written by me. I'm also offering to put anyone's other stories on it too. So if you're interested or you're just bored and you want to read check it out.


	56. Thats Some Big Roadkill

Ages, and ages ago, someone who was completely obsessed started writing a fan fiction. Then she stopped. But after still getting awesome reviews in her absence she was reinspired. She started writing again despite that school was inadvertently trying to kill her, her car insurance was too expensive, and then there were the boy problems (and not the good kind).

So. On with the show, I suppose.

Let the record show that I still do NOT own Maximum Ride.

* * *

**Cat's POV:**

Tarzan was back! I wasn't the only leader in the pride anymore! Praise all that is holy, I am not the only one responsible for all these kids! I sat in the back of our stolen car smiling uncontrollably, only stopping when I thought about all the terrible things that happened between the fair and our attack on Itron. Like having to make Eric turn on Layla, multiple times then getting his burned in that Itron explosion, like making Salem think that Eric had abandoned us then her accidentally killing Hunter (or wounding, we weren't sure), like being the one responsible for getting Taz in a car accident (even if I hadn't known they were with those Erasers at the time), like Tarzan and Kitten being in such a desperate situation that they had to trust the likes of Hunter and eventually get brainwashed.

I shook my head of those thoughts. All the risks had been worth it as selfish as it probably was to think that. I had everyone back and that was that. Or so I thought. Suddenly Salem woke up. She was in the middle aisle of the car lounging quietly. Boy, she'd been sleeping a lot since our brush with Itron. She sat up so quickly it was obviously something had shook her.

"Stop!" she cried. None of us registered this. We were just going around the bend. The forest was thick. No one saw any danger anywhere. Eric looked around, wincing as his bandages rubbed against his arms.

"What? Why?" he asked.

"STOP! Stop right now!" Salem cried leaning forward to shake Tarzan's shoulder.

"What?" Tarzan said. Then suddenly as the road turned we all saw it. A huge black blob in the middle of the road. Tarzan threw on the brakes. We all looked for something to grab onto. I just held onto Taz who I held in my lap (I know. Illegal. But he was a pretty sturdy kid, remember he's a hybrid). The car skid to a stop, tilting just a tad and then landing firmly on all four wheels.

The car was quiet except for all of our panicked breathing. I gave Taz to Salem as I moved up the windshield to see what had put us to a stop.

"What is it?" Eric asked. I nodded to Tarzan.

"All of you stay here," Tarzan said. I opened my car door and he got out of his. We approached the bloodied mass of black fur. The stench was horrible. It was roadkill. Very big road kill. Or maybe not, upon further inspection. It was just dead.

"What is it?" I asked Tarzan. He shook his head. He just stared at it. "You okay?"

"Weak stomach," he reminded me.

"Oh yeah," I said. I moved closer and moved its head with my foot. A pink tongue lolled out. It's lips crusted and half chewed on by flies. Tarzan and I took a step back.

"Eraser," he said.

"But its dead. Why is it just laying out in the middle of the road? You'd think the white coats would be a little more careful with their disposables," I muttered.

"The back of the neck!" came a voice from the van. We turned around. Salem had her head sticking out the window. "Is there a date on the back of the neck?"

"A what?" Tarzan and I chorused.

"A date!" Tarzan looked at me expectingly. Of course I was going to have to be the one to touch the dead body. I knelt down warily, half afraid it was going to jump up and swipe my head off my shoulders. I swallowed hard and moved its fur. I wanted to vomit being this close to a dead Eraser, a former kid no doubt. There was nothing, but pink skin underneath its thick fur.

"No date!" I confirmed. But I was now in dire need of hand sanitizer.

"Should we just leave it like this?" Tarzan asked as I went over to stand by him again.

"Well, I'm not strong enough to move that gigantic thing. You want to give it a shot?" I asked him. Tarzan gagged.

"No, let's leave it," he said. "Maybe we'll get lucky and someone will find it and lead it back to Itron."

"Fat chance," I snorted. Not with our luck.

We went back to the car minds spinning, paranoia at level at a very burnt orange. Tarzan backed up the car and then went around the Eraser body. All of us watched it disappear in the rearview mirror.

"How did it die?" Eric asked.

"There were no wounds," Tarzan said. He looked at Salem briefly.

"Sale, how did you know that was in the middle of the road?" I said voicing his question. Salem looked out the window. Black fur, black hair, black clothes silhouetted against the bright setting sun.

"I saw it before we hit it. I was just looking out the window," Salem said quietly. I sense her lying like it was radiating off her. Boy, I hoped I lied better than she did.

"I didn't see it. And I'm the one driving," Tarzan said. She shrugged.

"Why did you ask to look on the back of its neck?" I asked her. She turned to face me. Now I could tell she was confident in telling me.

"It's in Fang's blog. The School sometimes kills Erasers. An expiration date will appear on the back of their necks," Salem said.

"This one didn't. So how did it die?" I asked.

"Maybe it was sick," Kitten said. I hadn't thought of that. And I had touched it. I felt a lump in my throat.

"Eric, can you hand me some hand sanitizer?" I asked Eric. He opened the glove compartment and tossed it my way. I spread it all over myself and everything I touched. Meanwhile, I had half a mind on Salem who'd been far too quiet without her laptop in front of her. Sometimes you just know when something is wrong.

* * *

**Salem's POV:**

I fell asleep easily, probably with the telepathic Hunter who was stuck in my head. I guess it was kind of nice to have a place to run to inside my own head. To that hotel room that Hunter had created as a meeting place for us both. Where he looked normal, aside for the bandages around his eyes, and I looked normal. I didn't even know it this was how I looked normal, I just didn't have fur all over me.

However, it was the situation at hand that brought me back to this little hotel room inside my head.

"You were right," I said to Hunter who was lying on the bed facing the ceiling.

"I'm always right," he said. I ignored the conceded tone.

"No. But you were _right_! It was there the exact moment you said it would be there. In fact, if I hadn't have warned them we would've pummeled right into that Eraser," I said still in awe of what happened. "And the School isn't killing them, at least not like they were before. They're just..."

"Dead," Hunter finished. He sighed.

"Salem, this is what this is all about. The dead Erasers," he said.

"There's more?" I asked him turning to face him.

"Of course. It wouldn't be an epidemic if it were just one," he said. I sat at the edge of the bed with my back to him. I stared at one of the cheesy hotel paintings across the wall.

"Do you know what's causing it?" I asked.

"No."

"How did you even know it was there? Do you have GPS location on all dead Erasers?" I said getting frustrated.

"Would you like me to help you or not?" Hunter growled.

"Why should I?" I snapped. "Dead Erasers aren't our problem."

"They might be your problem if they are Taz," Hunter said. I stiffened at the sound of his name. I always forgot he was an Eraser too, most of the time he was just a baby. I turned to face him. He couldn't meet my gaze with the bandages.

"Taz is in danger?" I asked.

"So are Layla and Jason. Do you still want to help them?" he asked. I sighed. Those dumb Erasers. Always doing stuff to make us all like them. As much as I hated to admit it, we did owe it to them. Just like I owed it to Hunter. I owed everything to Hunter. I nearly killed the guy.

"Yeah," I said.

"Then do exactly as I say," he said.

* * *

Yay! I'm back. And for those who still haven't and want to read something, anything, or maybe submit something to be displayed, check out my website at

http://winged(dot)tripod(dot)com


	57. Just Every Bafflement

Hey there! Yes, I am posting again. I know, I've been terrible when it comes to this story which by far is the most popular. I'll be adding pretty regular from now on I think. Or at least I'll try to. Writer's block tends to sneak up on a person.

I don't own Maximum Ride. (Do I even need to write this anymore?)

* * *

Cat's POV:

We arrived at the cabin a good two hours after approaching the dead Eraser. It was risky, but we were in no shape to travel anymore. We unloaded the kids and cautiously approached the building. All of us were quiet waiting for the sound of scuffling, or Taz's tell tale Uh-oh's that were surprisingly accurate. Nothing happened. Now there was a surprise. We weren't pummeled on sight.

I sighed with relief as we opened the cabin door and no one was there.

"It's about time we caught a break," Tarzan muttered. I smiled. Isn't it great when someone else says exactly what you're thinking? I shifted Taz in my arms. He gurgled happily. I set him down on the ground. He wobbled over to the TV and slapped it with his hand.

"You think Sesame Street is on?" Kitten said following his direction. Meanwhile Tarzan and I stood still on guard. Eric joined us.

"Is it safe?" he asked.

"Probably not. Make yourself at home," I said. He shrugged indifferently. Salem made her way to a bedroom first thing. "I'm worried about her," I said to Tarzan as the door slammed.

"Tell me about it," he agreed. We both ventured into the kitchen and began our scavenging. Tarzan sighed.

"I'm exhausted," he groaned. I muttered an a agreement, not even bothering to use any words. I sat down at the cupboard on the floor and sighed. There were soups galore. I took them out one by one. Tarzan sat beside me watching me. I looked sideways at him, holding back a smile.

"What?" I asked.

"Nothing," he said. We stared at each other for a moment. Then he smiled.

"I meant what I said, you know, when I said you did a great job running the pride and getting us back," he said. My heart sped up. I wondered if he could hear it pounding as loud as I could. He leaned forward. I sat still in waiting. I sucked in a breath through my nostrils ignoring the white noise of the television coming from the other room. Then he did something I hadn't expected. He plucked an eyelash from my brow and blew it away.

"Sorry. That was bothering me," he said. I exhaled cursing myself that I had been awaiting a kiss. He pulled away and picked himself up. He swaggered out of the kitchen tail swishing cocky behind him. I wanted to growl in frustration. Instead I repeatedly hit my head on the cupboard.

"Uh, Cat?" I looked up. Eric was in the doorway of the kitchen. I quickly maintained my composure.

"Yes," I answered trying my best not to look flustered. Eric cocked an eyebrow at me.

"What's for dinner?" I picked up a random can and read it.

"Spaghettios?" I answered. Eric nodded quickly. He started to leave. "Hey, Eric?" He turned around. I patted the tile next to me. Eric slowly sat down where Tarzan once was.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing," I said. "I just wanted to talk to you." In truth I wanted company. Something to keep my mind off Tarzan who was buzzing around my brain ever since our daring escape. He glanced at me.

"About Layla?" he asked looking disappointed. This caught me by surprise. That hadn't been my intention.

"Not really," I said. Eric blushed.

"I can't..." he started. "I can't stop thinking about her." He watched the tile ground. "The way she looked when she betrayed me. She turned me into her dad, her dad, Jason's dad, the whitecoat. I felt so..." Helpless, I wanted to finish. I remembered the way I felt when I'd thought Tarzan was going to kill me. Well, as terrible as it was that he wanted me that I would have been okay with it. Because he wanted it. I just had to...

"Layla," Eric said. He huffed. "What a bitch." He picked up a can of soup and threw it on the ground. The tin can dented and leaked chicken broth.

"Not that I disagree or anything, but you don't have to take it out on our only food source," I said. He half smiled at me. It was an attempt to be happy, but it was pathetic.

"Sorry," he said. "I just... I wish that I didn't want... I wish I still hated Erasers."

"Me too," I whispered. I sighed. "It was a lot easier when Taz was just a baby and I wasn't blood related to my mortal enemy."

"Yeah. It's all very soap-opera-Star-Wars," Eric mentioned. I looked out the doorway. "Do you know what's wrong with Salem?"

No, I wish I did.

"She's just tired," I heard myself say.

* * *

Salem's POV:

This descent to my hotel room was a different. For one when I got there I appeared in the bedroom part of it. Hunter was not laying there on top of the covers. I heard a shuffling from the other part of the room.

"Hunter?" I called out. My voice echoed off the walls.

There was a hint of whispering. I went to the living room area where there was a love seat couch and coffee table. Normally I started out there and made my way to the coffee table. Instead I went there and saw Hunter sitting straight up and stiff. His head cocked my way. That wasn't the surprising part. The surprising part was that he was surrounded by whitecoats. I gasped and started to backpeddle.

"It's okay, Salem," said one of the whitecoats. I shrieked and turned to run. The whitecoats jogged after me. I went to the front door and tried to open it. Of course not. I couldn't escape my own nightmare! Tears were falling down my face. I felt the whitecoats grab me by the arms. They pulled me as I kicked and screamed with all my strength.

"Salem, calm down!"

"Quiet!" one whitecoat ordered. I couldn't. I fell limp on the floor as they dragged me away and screamed. Hands went over my mouth. _Big mistake._ Ew! I could taste blood in my mouth that wasn't my own. It was disgusting!

"Ah!" the whitecoat pulled his hand away. I flopped over to my feet arching my back in Cat's war stance. However, she was more graceful on four legs while I was built for two. I pounced to my legs and ran hard across the room pumping my legs.

"Salem!"

"Salem!"

"Salem!"

"Stop!" I cried as I shut the bathroom door. I locked it quickly before I could even realize what I was doing. I placed my back against it, pushing my feet flat the tub across from me to help it stay closed. The door continued to pound. I continued to cry. I really was insane. I wished my pride was here.

"Salem, open this door," shouted a voice.

"Oh, sure! Now you talk to me! Before you just shoved needles in me and dragged me wherever you wanted me!" I cried. There was a sigh on the other side of the door.

"She won't cooperate," sighed a female.

"Damn right, I won't!" I cried, then instintually waited for Cat to tell me I wasn't old enough to curse. I heard nothing. There was no one to tell me to watch my manners. I wanted to cry again. No, no. Max wouldn't cry. Cat certainly wouldn't cry. But the tears just kept pouring. "I'm in my own head. I can escape." I closed my eyes and opened them again. I was still right there.

"Hunter won't let you wake up. He's in control," said the man. "Salem, please, let me introduce myself."

I didn't want him to introduce himself. I wanted to wake up. I wanted to get out of here. I wanted to wake up and run to Cat.

"I hear you're a fan of the blog," said the whitecoat. I grit my teeth. It annoyed me that he thought he knew me. The illogical side of me wanted to argue with him some more. I wanted to scream about the wrongs done to me and my pride. But I stayed quiet. "You might have heard of me." That instant my blood ran cold. I might have heard of him? Then it dawned on me. I knew who he was. I stood up and slowly unlocked the door. I opened the door.

The blue eyed, blonde haired man stared back at me. I felt my eyes narrow as I studied his face. It _was_ familiar.

"Jeb?" I asked him. He gave a small grin.

* * *

Yay! I'm back. And for those who still haven't and want to read something, anything, or maybe submit something to be displayed, check out my website at

http://winged(dot)tripod(dot)com


	58. Epinewho?

Still don't own Maximum Ride, oh the sadness of it all. On with the freaking out!

* * *

Cat's POV: 

Erasers!

That's the first thing that popped in my head when I heard the shrill girlish scream. I dropped the pot I was holding that was filled with three, going on four, cans of spaghettios. A wave of round noodles jumped out of the pot. Halfway down the hallway Tarzan and I collided rushing toward the same emergency. I staggered and started to fall backward. It was like running into a brickwall. Luckily, he caught me while moodily telling to, "Watch where you're going, Cat! Where's Salem!"

We burst into one of the guest rooms. Salem was flat on her back screaming at the ceiling.

"Stop!" she screamed. The rest of her words were muffled. Tarzan leaned over her and shook her gently by the shoulders.

"Sale! Sale! Wake up!" he cried.

Tears started to pour out through her closed eyes. He tried to shake her again. She wasn't waking up. Eric appeared in the doorway with a worried look.

"What's going on?"

"Get some cold water!" I ordered. Eric didn't hesitate. Then all of the sudden Salem stopped crying. She was just asleep. I looked at Tarzan. We had matching worried looks.

"Hurry up, Eric!" Tarzan barked.

"I'm coming!" Eric said half worried, half annoyed. He had the water in a huge vase that must have been an object in the cabin I overlooked. We got out of the way as he tossed it at her. Salem stopped tossing and turning in her sleep. She laid there wet and peaceful. I crawled up beside her and tried to shake her again.

"Salem! Salem!" I cried in her sensitive ears. She wouldn't wake up. I leaned forward pressing my ear against her chest. Her heart was beating.

"What's going on?" Kitten asked holding Taz who was straining to see what the commotion was about.

"Nothing, hun. Eric, can you watch Kitten?" I asked Eric. He stared at Salem lying perfectly still on the bed. Then slowly he nodded and tore himself away from the scene.

"Come on, Kit. Go watch TV," Eric said ushering her out of the room. Kitten looked over her shoulder to sneak one last peak.

"What's wrong with Salem?" she asked. I didn't hear Eric's response as he shut the door behind us. Tarzan and I stared helplessly at our Salem.

"Why won't she wake up?" my voice cracked even if I had only whispered.

"I don't know," Tarzan said. He reached around her and picked her up. She wrapped her arms around his neck instinctually, not like a twelve year old, but more more like a six year old. I leaned into him and pushed her hair out of the way. Stroking her cheek was much like stroking a cat. Her short fur felt was soft until I reached the tear stained part.

"Sale," I said hoping the tears that were forming wouldn't fall. Tarzan rocked her slowly.

"What do we do?" Tarzan asked me.

"I-I don't know," I said. Wow, the truth shall set you free. I couldn't believe I didn't lie and make up some stupid plan right there. But this was Tarzan. He might have some hairbrained scheme. God bless his giant soul, he did.

"Hospital," he said. I didn't say it was a very good one.

"Hell no!" I responded.

"No! We're not going to admit her!" Tarzan said with a shocked look on his face. Damn right we're not! "We're going to steal something to wake her up."

"Like what?" I asked.

"Epinephrine," came a response from the doorway. We both turned. Eric was in the doorway, hand on the doorknob. He shrugged. "I saw it in a movie once."

"No! No drugs! Let's just..." I started. "Let's just give her a second. Maybe she'll wake up."

"No, Cat! She didn't wake up when we shook her or threw water on her! Cat, this isn't a normal type of sleep! She's in a coma or something!" Tarzan snapped at me. I glared at him.

"So, what? She's just screaming while she's in a coma? I don't think so!" I barked.

"What if she's sick? What if that's what she needs? Eric, get Salem's laptop and search something like this on the internet, NOW!" Tarzan said. Something about his tone sent Eric running. Eric came back with Salem's laptop. He plopped on the floor and started to clack away furiously at the keyboard. I moved away the wet blankets from the bed. Tarzan put Salem down. Her limp body molded easily in the mattress. It was scary.

"Eric," I said turning to face him.

"I don't know where to look," Eric said. Tarzan and I both turned to face him, horrified. Eric held his hands up defensively. "Hey, I'm not the one that's good with computer stuff," he said. He was right. We relied on Salem for that. I swallowed hard.

"What about that stuff you said. The... The epi- epin..eo...frine," Tarzan said slowly trying to find the words.

"Epinephrine?" Eric said cocking an eyebrow.

"Just look it up Eric!" I demanded. He did.

"It says its for allergic reactions," he said.

"Well then, why are we giving it to her?" I yelled at Eric.

"Because, in the movie they said it would speed up your heart rate! It should make her all jittery, it will tap into her flight-or-flight response which might wake her up!" Eric yelled back at me.

"Are you sure?" I asked him.

"No," Eric said slowly. I glanced at Tarzan then walked over to the computer screen. I swallowed hard.

"Okay," I said. "Lets go to the nearest hospital. Look it up. Who's going in and who's staying here?" I asked. Tarzan and I met gazes. Separating hadn't worked so good for us the last time. Eric set the laptop aside.

"Just let me watch the. You guys go," he said.

"No," I said automatically.

"We can't take Salem with us, and if we take too many people with us we'll be too suspicious," Tarzan said. I chewed my lip in thought. Finally I sighed.

"Alright," I consented. Tarzan grabbed me by the arm and led the way out the front door to the car.

* * *

Yay! I'm back. And for those who still haven't and want to read something, anything, or maybe submit something to be displayed, check out my website at 

http://winged(dot)tripod(dot)com


	59. The Cure

No tengo Maximum Ride! Por quuuuuuuuuuuuuue!

* * *

Cat's POV:

It turned out we couldn't start the car without Salem, the human generator. Tarzan and I stood helplessly in front of the SUV. I felt my eyes water as I forced myself to take in a breath. I glanced at Tarzan who was starting to get the same glassy eyed look.

"Alright then," he said. "We'll wait."

Like we had a choice.

* * *

Salem's POV:

I stared up at the man in front of me. He was taller than I'd imagined. But his grin was the same from what little I saw from her. His hair blonde like her's.

"What are you doing inside my head?" I asked cautiously. Jeb turned around to look at Hunter who's head was cocked our way, eavesdropping on everything that happened.

"Hunter is projecting our image into your dreams. We need to speak with you which is difficult when you and your pride are running from place to place," Jeb said. I narrowed my eyes.

"We wouldn't have to if the whitecoats weren't after us," was my immediate accusation. Jeb grit his teeth.

"I am not with Itron anymore," he said. His lab coat suggested otherwise. I folded my arms stubbornly.

"Hunter, make them go away," I said. Hunter didn't respond from his spot on the couch.

"Many of Itron's creations, most of them being Eraser, are dying. It is a viral disease they have no immunity for," Jeb explained.

"So?" I said raising my chin a little.

"Have any of you cats gotten sick?" he asked. I shifted my weight to one leg, leaning with my arms crossed with attitude. I thought for a moment.

"No," I said.

"Did one of you touch the dead body on the road?" asked one of the other whitecoats. I glared at her.

"Cat did... Why? Is she going to get sick?" I asked starting to get worried. The whitecoats looked at one another.

"Not if she isn't sick already," Jeb said. He looked to the other whitecoats. "It looks like we've found our cure." I glanced over at Hunter.

"Hunter, what are they all doing here?" I asked him.

"They wanted to speak with you," Hunter answered plainly.

"Why me? Why not go talk to Cat or Tarzan?" I asked them.

"Hunter said he could only contact you from as far of a distance we're at. He says you two have had some sort of connection ever since his... accident," Jeb said.

"Yeah, well... Is there anything else you gotta say or can I wake up now?" I asked the whitecoats. Jeb opened his mouth to says something. He suddenly stopped in mid-action like someone had pressed the pause button on him. Hunter stood from his seat on the couch as he walked over our way.

"One more thing," Hunter said. The whitecoats fizzled and disappeared from my dreamworld hotel room. Hunter and I were alone again, and I was still standing in the doorway of the bathroom. Hunter stood a good friendly distance from me. "You have to come to us. Alone. No Pride. No Flock. No anyone. Just _you_. We need a sample of blood from someone who is a cat." I swallowed hard.

"Why can't they just use yours?" I asked.

"Because currently, I'm sick with the same disease. For some reason I don't have an immunity either. The whitecoats say that its probably because you're all out there free and open to build immunities. I'm not," he said almost sadly.

"How come I have to do it?" I asked.

"I doubt Cat or Tarzan would come willingly to us to give a blood sample, even if it meant getting a vaccination for Taz. So they can't know you're coming. They would try to stop you," he said. I stiffened.

"If they don't know where I am how am I supposed to get there?" I said meaning for him to get to his point.

"I want you to abandon the pride and meet us at a rendevous. From there we will take your blood sample in order to create a cure," he said.

"Since when does Jeb want to keep Erasers from dying? He didn't give a crap when Ari died," I said angrily.

"Obviously he did, because he's been rehabilitating hurt Erasers and other mutants that had been deserted by Itron ever since his son's death. That's how they picked me up," Hunter said.

"And what if I don't want to meet Jeb in real life?" I said. Hunter sighed. He reached up and started to undo the bandages around his eyes. I felt my own eyes widen in response. He unwrapped the last of the gauze and showed me his swollen eyes sockets, sunken in with no more working eyeballs inside. I felt my stomach wretch. I remembered now. I had done that to him in our last fight when I'd accidentally electrocuted him with his own shock collar.

"You remember when you did this to me?" he asked his lids straining over the empty holes. I took a step backward. I was stunned, horrified.

He advanced. "I-It was an accident," I said barely able to find a voice.

"I'm _dying_ just like dozens of Erasers. You have the cure and you owe me, Salem," he said with a snarl. "You owe me big time." I was standing there mouth gaped open like an idiot. What could I say? Suddenly the corner of Hunter's mouth twitched in a semi smile.

"Hmph," he said amused. "We'll see you in the next Eastern town. I'll send a van for you."

I awoke so fast that I sat up immediately, only to be pummeled by Cat back down at my back. Cat hovered over me.

"Salem! Never, ever, EVER do that again or I swear to GOD there will be no more Sesame Street! Do you understand me?" she screamed in my face. My eyes widened. My heart was going so fast it was no longer beating, now it was more like a vibrating hum in my chest. Cat's eyes softened. She gave a more normal hug. "I don't mean that, you can watch as much Sesame Street as you want. I'm just glad you're okay!"

Suddenly another set of arms wrapped around me from behind. Tarzan gave me a bone crushing hug that left me gasping for breath. Over his shoulder Eric, Kitten, and Taz were watching me from the doorway. Even Eric looked relieved to see me.

"How long was I asleep?" I asked them.

"Two hours," Tarzan answered.

"You were screaming in your sleep. We couldn't wake you up," Cat said hugging me, which sandwhiched me in between Tarzan and Cat at the same time. I felt like my lungs were going to pop.

"Can you please let go?" I begged.

Tarzan released me. Cat was a tad bit more reluctant.

"Fine," she said with a sigh, then ruffled my hair which was... wet?

"Spaghettios are ready!" Kitten announced.

With that everyone left to get a bowlful. I swallowed as I readied myself for a barrage of questions at dinner. Later tonight, I was going to have to make an escape plan.

* * *

Yay! I'm back. And for those who still haven't and want to read something, anything, or maybe submit something to be displayed, check out my website at

http://winged516(dot)tripod(dot)com

FOR THOSE WHO TRIED THIS LINK BEFORE AND GOT SOME WEIRD WEBSITE, THAT'S MY BAD. IT'S winged516 NOT JUST winged.


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